[00:00:00] Some of them don’t know what their talent is. Some of them say to me, I’m a dentist. I’m like, but what’s your talent? What’s your talent in dentistry? Do you have an artistic class in the composites, in the cosmetic? What’s your talent? You’ve really got to know yourself. So that’s one thing I look for. Do they know themselves where their talent is? Do they understand that? And how much do they have passion and respect for that? How much are they willing to thrive on that? Like, is it a passion? And I always say, are you obsessed with it? Because, like, I’m obsessed with what I do, whether it’s healthy or not healthy, it’s an obsession. And sometimes the best people that are the most successful are the ones that are really weirdly obsessed with what they do. And I want to know, are they obsessed with what what is what makes them tick about what they do?

[00:00:51] This is Dental Leaders podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging leaders and dentists. Treat your hosts Payman, Langroudi and Prav.

[00:01:06] Solanki gives me great pleasure to welcome Zabor Shaikh onto the podcast. Sabre’s the founder of Dental, which burst on the scene a couple of years ago. You obviously have a few other things going on, but even more impressive. But you’re fresh from giving birth to a child. Yeah, it’s been difficult to even the age because I couldn’t believe that you even could make time for us to come. It’s a pleasure to have you. Thanks a lot for

[00:01:38] Thank you for having me.

[00:01:40] This book was about trying to get to the to the crux of the person behind the sort of the persona of folks a little bit about your early life childhood. Why did you choose Dental Street, that sort of stuff?

[00:01:53] Ok, so I was born in northwest London. I grew up in a joint family set up. So two brothers married, two sisters. So we all lived in one household and my grandma lived with us as well. And my uncle had six kids and my dad has five. So I’m the eldest of all 11 kids. So it was a very busy household. And it was it was nice because I’ve always had two sets of parents. I’ve had two father figures, too, mother figures. So I’ve I’ve been very blessed in the family set up. We had strong values instilled from a young age. My grandmother’s story, you know, she came from Kenya. Settle down here. She was widowed at twenty eight with four young kids. So I saw my dad and my uncle really graft. They started off in a laundromat in Hounslow. They live above the laundromat and it was a real graft. My dad went to uni, but my uncle didn’t. And it’s how he grew as a person and my dad that really shaped us as kids. That’s what I feel, especially for me being the eldest. I saw a lot in the in the early graft of their careers and their whole life and how it shaped. So I feel like that’s where it really starts for me in terms of the journey of who I am and the characteristics that I have, I, I do believe it stemmed from my grandparents were extremely close to our grandparents, both of my mom and my dad’s side.

[00:03:28] And I think that’s where my work ethic really grew. And then going into dentistry, I always knew I wanted to go into healthcare. My dad’s business was in care homes, but I always enjoyed the sciences. It was never for my parents. It was never a pressure on what to do or have to go into specific industry. It was always just, you know, do what you enjoy and just that support go into something you enjoy, be a profession or, you know, just have something you have passion in. So I really explored the sciences, more medicine, dentistry, pharmacy. They were kind of the things I explored. But I went into dentistry because I saw the flexibility in it. I saw the interaction with the people more than in the medicine. I felt that I could interact with people close to clinical and non-clinical. And also the business side was what really was my main goal. I always knew I wanted to go into business. I from a young age, I was probably really exposed to property business and how to run and grow brands. And I used to do that with my dad in my own case to see a lot of it. And I was looking at piano as I was looking at CapEx sheets. I just understood that business first hand. I didn’t you go to business school or anything like that? I learnt to quite young, so I knew that I wasn’t going to be clinical.

[00:04:55] I knew that I was never arty type of person. And that’s one thing in dentistry. I have complete respect for my clinicians because they’re actually artists, they really all are. They have such an artistic flair and mindset and creativity to them that I knew I just didn’t have and I knew that from the start. But I went into it knowing that I could create something different because everyone else that’s going into this wants to do it for the dentistry, whereas I’m doing it for the business. And I felt that that was my USP. So I always knew the brand that I could grow would be already unique to all the other Dental brands, because majority 80, 90 percent of dental practises or brands are built around a 100 clinician. And that would be my complete USP because this brand is not built around the primary principle being what known handed. So I got excited by that. I already knew that in my heart that’s what I was going to do. And then I went to Birmingham, studied that, and then I did my VTE in London. I worked in mixed practises for a couple of years. And then that’s when I got my first practise in Fleet Street. And now I’ve got three clinics, so Fleet Street, Notting Hill and Manchester. So that’s our latest clinic that just opened a year ago now.

[00:06:12] So your first prognosis, how long after qualifying sober?

[00:06:16] Four years. Four, five years. Yeah, so I qualified twenty fleet free opened 2015 and I was five months pregnant, so I had to joke with me. Every time I open the clinic there’s a baby somewhere. But you know, I always say to them, one of my biggest lessons from my grandparents and my dad is they had so many kids and people used to say the same thing. And my dad used to say that for every child that’s come into the world, there’s a moment that that child came in, was like the best opportunity or business opportunity that came at that time was like the biggest blessings came within that moment. And I really believe that because I see that coming down, because I see that every time I had a child or even as a child, as some of my people that’s walked in the clinic, Lindsey, when she had a baby, I’ve seen that those children were brought so much. We’ve had peaks in the business when those kids came. Things that happened that I never thought would happen are happening in those times. So I truly believe the blessings of family life and doing things holistically in your life, not just having work and then personal life. It’s about the balance of both, which is always the thing that everyone debates. How how can you have us stable?

[00:07:29] This business of your dad started with that one laundrette turned into a gigantic business we talk about in dentistry. Do we want our kids to be dentists and all of that? Yeah, well, they’re not. Did you not think, well, why don’t I just take over that business rather than doing your own brand?

[00:07:46] Yeah, I mean, the thing with my dad was he never pushed us to do what he was doing. I think he wanted us to learn the principles of what he was doing. If I wanted to do that and wanted to go into the home business and things like that, I think he would have been really happy and he would have been like, yes, one of the kids, it’s good to be here.

[00:08:05] We actively decided you didn’t want to go into the business.

[00:08:10] It wasn’t that I didn’t want to do it. I did do a lot of work within it early on. Might not like actual work, but I used to go into the cabins a lot. I used to see what they were doing. You know, my dad would always take us when we would have to be there for certain reasons. But I didn’t really I think I didn’t always think how I could link them to straight into the home because of special care dentistry. And I saw that was a big gap within that industry. So I thought that it could be something that I merge. But I just had an appeal with dentistry on a different level. I liked the clinical aspect as well, that clinical science behind the dentistry in the care home business. I feel like that would have been if I went into more of a medical way, then I could have. But then as the dentistry evolved, I did it really go in special care industry. I really just enjoyed the business so much that that’s really what I wanted to do.

[00:09:02] And so when you go through, you have to learn the basics of dentistry and what was the vision always in your mind, say the First Fleet Street clinic or whatever that was going to be on your radar, working towards that goal of owning your first practise? What was your vision at that point?

[00:09:20] Yeah, one hundred percent. I always wanted to I always had the thing like this is temporary. Like I didn’t enjoy clinical at all. And my trainer, he was so amazing, but he was so patient with me and he was just like it was it’s not that great. It was it was fine because I knew that wasn’t what I wanted to do. I knew I wasn’t that wasn’t my thing. But I was there and I was putting in the graft and I was learning everything that I needed to learn, because to be honest, if I didn’t have that experience as well, I wouldn’t understand a lot of what happens in the Dental practise as well. So I always had the vision of the practise, but I was always looking for the opportunity and the opportunity didn’t just come straight away. That was a lot of things that happened that I tried to acquire a practise. Then I tried to set up another practise. Then I tried another thing and all of things fell through. It wasn’t like I just got Fleet Street and then that’s it. It was like happy ending. It’s not. It took time. There was a lot of, like, bad moves on my part, trying to acquire something that didn’t work. And then looking back on it, they were like big moments in my life when I was like, oh my God, I’ve lost like, I’m never going to do this. I was like, rock bottom. Here we go again. Carry on working clinical until you can do it. So it was a craft. It was hard to get that right, a clinic and the right setting that I needed. It wasn’t easy at that time to be looking at practises, you know,

[00:10:43] Was it did you set up the clinic in Fleet Street or did you buy it?

[00:10:47] Yeah, they’re all squat practises and practises that also said.

[00:10:52] So when you opened your practise back then, four years post qualification, how did you get those patients through the door? Obviously, your marketing strategy now is is something the I think with Dental industry, a completely inaugural’s and everything you do from the content creation to everything is just spectacular. And what was what was your strategy back then in terms of getting patients through the door?

[00:11:18] It was basic strategy. It was we knew what we needed to do, but that was nothing different. There was nothing that no one else was doing. And it was hard. We didn’t have patients waiting at the door. We didn’t have our phones ringing at times when my team would say to me, the phone rang once today and we were losing money. We were losing a lot of money every month. And it wasn’t easy, especially when I was five months pregnant and I just had my first baby as well. First baby is very different to the baby, number two and three. So, you know, that was hard work. And there were times when I would say to my husband, I don’t know if this is ever going to do what we wanted to do. And he used to say to me that the day that this clinic makes profit will be the best I have. You know, it was so hard and I don’t think that there was anything that we did to tip it. It was just time. And there were certain things that were key moments within the journey that started to tip that. And that’s what when I saw those things come into play from the right dentist to the right, but just the right branding, the right dentist and then the right people that worked in the clinic, you know, one of the key members of staff coming in, she changed the whole journey. So the journey changed for people as well. And then that everything just came together. And slowly, slowly, you know, when that clinic first started to make profit, you know, it took it took a long time. It wasn’t easy to be.

[00:12:54] When you first opened the clinic, what was what was the set of? Were you hands on then clinical doing loads of what was it

[00:13:01] That actually I was I wasn’t doing loads of hours. I was just there to help Buffer. And that’s a when we didn’t have the right dentists or, you know, the dentist we wanted in that clinic. So I was that buffer when Lindsey came on board as well. She was my right hand woman in terms of like they would just do it, just get the patients in and you can do it and give me confidence to do clinical. But I knew in my heart that’s not where I was going to be and that was temporary. But yeah, I did I did have to do a bit of clinical in the beginning.

[00:13:31] But and then moving on from there, from the point you opened the doors to the moment you spun a profit for the first time. What we talk in in terms of time, scale,

[00:13:41] I think it was roughly around. A year, a year, over a year, I’d say, just before we rebranded. That’s what I think the reasoning of the rebrand was around, that I felt that the rebrand would rocket up. It would just I just knew what needed to be done at that time, in that moment. And that’s why we did the rebranding in that sense. So I could have that risk to take on myself to say this is what I want to do. And it was a risk. I was doing it on my own and rebranding to major clinics, but I just knew I had the right people around me as well. I had a fantastic marketing team and advisors who now have grown with me and it’s just grown massively. So I think that that tying in with the rebrand just changed everything quickly.

[00:14:35] But when I think of Dental, I think of, you know, talent, you see, you seem to be able to attract the kind of the big names, if you like, and in cosmetic dentistry to come and work there. Having said that, I mean, I’m sure some of them you’ve developed into big names while they’re working. But the other thing is I’ve had contact with some of you people with your courses and all of that. There’s a general feeling from them that you are such a great motivator. And so often when you talk to staff and all of them without without exception, I know a lot of young people from Mattie Parsons, who teaches on our course to some of you support. So all of them without without exception or people saying that she’s brilliant, she’s going she’s motivated. Is that something that you’ve sort of looked into or is that just the natural way you all you’ve learnt from your parents? What is it?

[00:15:36] I think it started off definitely something from my uncle, my dad. I saw how they worked well. And what were their biggest assets to them as Leaders in their businesses? I saw what worked really well. And after 20, 30 years, those people, the way they used to, they still speak about my parents and my uncle and my grandparents, the way they speak so highly of them and they’re connected to them. I learnt from a young age how that was so important and valued the time and effort that my dad and my uncle give is unbelievable. And they they scaled up massively right now, but they still are able to touch a lot of people within their companies. So I learnt that from a young age and I think that was naturally in me. I just naturally have that kind of personality. That’s what I thrive off, really. That’s what I that’s what I see is my main job role. But then I did invest into it further. I do have a massive interest on the psychology side of things and behaviours. And I trained for two years in personal coaching like life coaching and mindfulness, and that I trained to become a coach for the purpose of a business business properties with my within my own clinic. And then I started to do coaching within the team on team levels. But then I realised when I was doing it, it was opening cans of worms within my teams with each other in terms of things that they didn’t want to say in a team environment.

[00:17:08] So now I do a lot one to one. A lot of them probably don’t know. I do it as not having like a coaching session or a session. It’s my kind of tools and my like, kind of just my toolkit on how to deal with people and how to speak to them. How to listen to them in all is just one to one mainly. And that’s done with everyone. I don’t just sit with them and sit with everyone every week. It’s done throughout the week through phone calls, even interactions. And I just passing by. There’s tools that I use that naturally is just to help me to really engage with different types of people, from patients to my nurses to my teachers to my directors, to high level business ambassadors, things like that. And it’s about being able to interact with everyone and engage with everyone. And that you have to learn. I think you have to really invest in understanding that that’s not something that you can just I didn’t have like that deeper understanding, but there’s there is things to look into. And I think just being conscious of it is the first step. But just to be conscious of it, sometimes we’re just not conscious how we walk past someone or how we just even look at someone. Even your physical language says everything, and especially as your boss, like they say, you know, that physical language is everything to your staff before you even open your mouth because they have an assumption about you straightaway. So I think that

[00:18:38] Speaks to some specific sabr, some examples, specific examples. Maybe I’ll know something you or your dad did with. With someone and then something’s specific examples of stuff that you can help someone can learn from.

[00:18:51] I think it’s one of the most important things I would say that I think I still don’t do well enough as well. Like Red’s always knows this and he’s always, like, pinching me, as I remember. But is the listening and the way to listen, because you can listen to someone and you can hear them out, but you’ve already made your judgements about what you feel. And it’s the open minded listening. It’s listening with an open mind, whereas a lot of people within the workplace that have already made up their mind and they’re right and you’re wrong and that’s it. And they have all the reasons why they’re right and they probably might be right. That’s not that we’re saying they’re wrong, but the way you listen to the other person and make them feel about their opinion, that is a massive I’d say, plus, because the way you can listen to them is shows that how you can explain something to them, because if you want to explain your point of view, you can explain it away. They can have understanding, whereas explaining your point of view in a way that you’re attacking them, you’re never going to get them to understand. They’re never going to change their mind. Whereas I feel like if I can really listen to what that person is saying and empathise, I put myself in their shoes and their rights. This was a big deal in their eyes. This did happen. And a lot of people just say, well, she’s lying or she’s doing this and I’m not. I never look at people in a negative light. I’ll always give them the benefit of the doubt, saying actually for her that was a big deal for him. That was that is on. And then I don’t put my opinion on that. I will listen to that and then give some sort of advice. But if I need them to understand what I’m saying, they do listen. Then they turn around and listen to me because I’ve given them their opinion, respect and I think respect to the massive thing.

[00:20:34] Lovely thing. It’s a lovely idea. And obviously, you’ve got to feel that way for it to be real. But give me the tactic. What’s the tactic for you? Do you repeat back to them what they say or something like that?

[00:20:47] Yeah, I think what I would do is engage in what they’re saying more than I’m saying. I think a lot of people talk and they only talk about what their point is. But whereas I would repeat that point. So if someone says this is how something made me feel and this is the reasoning, I’d be like, you know what, I understand your reasoning because I’m from your point of view, it looks like this. I’m from you in your shoes. It’s this, this, this. So I can understand. You’re right. Then I always agree that they’re right, because that’s an opinion you can’t say to someone that’s wrong, whereas and then I’ll say, well, can you understand from either my perspective or the other person’s perspective that this this this might have been their ideas and they don’t actually see what your ideas are. And from that moment on, that person’s like, yeah, I can see that they now are in agreement with you. They’re not attacking each other. They’re in agreement. And they’re like, OK, we can agree that we’re all seeing things in different lens. But then how do we come together, guys? How do we come together and think, is there a solution or is there something we’re missing? Are we just looking too much inside what we think or is that we need to think about the greater picture? I feel like in this setting, everything in the Dental practise is so intricate and so micro environment that the bigger picture is always missed.

[00:22:02] That’s one of my biggest things. When I come in, I’m always talking bigger picture because I’m not in the micro environment. I’m not in there with them. So I respect their environment, I respect what they saying. But then they also respect that, oh my God, she’s opened our eyes like she’s looking at it from a completely different way. And I think that excites them because they want to know what I think they want to know. A lot of them will call me straight away or text me and say, what do you think about this? What do you think about that? Because they respect that I’m coming from a different lens to them and I’m not trying to tell them that that is wrong.

[00:22:34] Baby emissions, you’ve undergone quite a bit of coaching yourself and learning. And you listen, obviously, you mentioned that you use various tools. We have to talk about specific courses that you weren’t always a part of the Dental County School or what was it?

[00:22:52] To be honest, it was something that my mom and my auntie were doing. They were doing a life coaching. It’s called the inside out. I think it’s from from America coaches in America. And it’s a personal development. It wasn’t actually something that they were doing for business perspective. They were doing it for personal development. And then I decided to do it to figure out my work life balance. I was struggling with the mom girl with my ambitions. And, you know, I was struggling with how do I juggle? Everything can be the best at everything. So I did that for myself. And it really helped me in the first year, helped me change my plans in terms of looking at things from a positive approach and realising that a lot was coming from my thoughts and not the reality of what was happening. And I was missing a lot of being in the present with my kids and being in the present with my businesses and being in the present of enjoying the journey. As well, so that changed my perspective and I saw that me changing change the business and changed my staff without me even doing anything. It was just because I changed my actions and my intentions. I didn’t enforce on anyone. I just changed myself. And I feel like that’s what makes you a good leader, is because they see what you’re doing. It’s not telling them what to do. They see Microsoft. They see what I do. I don’t do they see how much effort I put into it and my passion that I think the passion really gets them. And then they generally, most of them, all of them that work and they all have passion. They all have that. So I look for that. I look for that when I interview. I really look for the passion within themselves and the career, because then my job is easy, because if they’ve got passion, I just motivate a mentor and coach and the rest they do.

[00:24:36] So you’ve attracted these wicked dentists. Let’s say if I was a young associate looking to work through. Yeah, OK. You said you want someone passionate. Yeah, well, I mean, literally, if that’s if that’s what I want to do, I want to welcome you advise me to do as a young associate who wants to be part of that team. Do I have to do courses. What have to do.

[00:25:05] So if you step back, what I’m trying to create with the dentist is what my husband’s taught me. And in building a football team, that’s basically how his analogy of what I’m doing is. And if you just see that and I’ve always looked into the best sports coaches and how sports coaches really work, because that’s really inspired me in terms of their journeys and how they attract talent. And it’s not about them, it’s how they combine the talent together. And that’s really what my ambition is with. Drew is combining the talent. So my first thing when I look for is what’s that talent? Is that talent what we’re looking for? And do they have the talent? Is it that a lot of dentists, they are general restorative Dental. That’s absolutely fine. And that talent is in that. And we need those. We need different. But what is the talent of some of them don’t know what their talent is. Some of them say to me, I’m a dentist. I’m like, but what’s your talent? What’s your talent in dentistry? Do you have an artistic class in the composite? It’s in the cosmetics. What’s your talent? You’ve really got to know yourself. So that’s one thing I look for. Do they know themselves where their talent is? Do they understand that? And how much do they have passion and respect for that? How much are they willing to thrive on that? Like, is it a passion? And I always say, are you obsessed with it? Because, like, I’m obsessed with what I do, whether it’s healthy or not healthy, it’s an obsession. And sometimes the best people that are the most successful are the ones that are really weirdly obsessed with do. And I want to know, are they obsessed with what what is it? What makes them tick about what they do? Do they enjoy that? And then I would look at why do they want to go with it? What’s their intention for being what? Where do you want to go with it? Is it that they’re going to value add and bring something that someone else doesn’t have? That’s what I’m looking for.

[00:27:00] If you’re coming into RWD, just to replicate another another one of the dentists, that’s not a value add value add is someone that say to me, Zabor, this is what you are actually missing. This is what I can bring to the table. I might do things this way. And it’s there’s loads of ways to do that in dentistry. A lot of dentists to me, but I’m a cosmetic dentist. I’m like, yeah, those are some of my dentist are into composite bonding, somewhat into different things. Small Macon’s in a different way. Some people are into the injectable mould, composite techniques, the different techniques. Tell me what what is it that you’re into? So I’m looking for that flat and it’s quite deep. And I can tell straight away if it’s Dental, that has no idea because I haven’t even thought of those things. That’s not really questions they get Austin normal interviews. So they go back and I’ve had dentists go back, think I have more experience and come back to me and say, actually, we know now who we are and then I like you already to because I want them to value-add. It’s not I always say we was in the training ground. It’s more ground when you’re saying, I’m looking for my Stryker’s, I’m looking for those elite clinicians, and that’s what I want it to be about,

[00:28:09] Say you interviewing all team members and you’ve got a relationship with all team members at every level, right? Well, I do well.

[00:28:20] And Koshy do so at the moment. I have like managers and stuff that kind of triage and filter through. And when I recruit, then I will try and meet everyone before that final decision of hiring someone or me or Lindsay or I’ll try and zoom them. So in the last couple of months when I’ve been off maternity, there’s a few new people that I hadn’t met. And so that. My first thing that I need to go and do is meet meet them, because I’ve heard so much about them and that that is really close to me. That’s really important to me to meet them and and get to know them.

[00:28:55] And then you spoke about people bringing the value to the business. I mean, one of the things that’s so, so clear about many of the clinicians, that is the Instagram presence, right? Yeah. They all they all share in common. Is that something that you can look at and forth and is checking out their social profile a big part of the recruitment process?

[00:29:19] So it is and it isn’t. So we do check it so we know where they might be like sitting in terms of their work shows a lot of that portfolio as well. So if they have a strong Instagram presence, it does show their portfolio of work, but it’s not a criteria. I would say that they have to have a strong, strong following or they have to be strong. And that’s not because I have some dentists that work for me that don’t they didn’t have that in the beginning and they don’t want to grow that or something. But it’s naturally evolved that way. I would say I would say that a lot of the patients and the demographic of people we’re attracting is within that kind of demographic of Instagram. So we do say to the dentist that it does help because we put them on our Instagram as well. So it helps

[00:30:07] And help them grow their Instagram as well. It looks like the content you’re creating for the brand with room is some of the deal as well. You’ll help them grow their social presence if they want to.

[00:30:22] Yeah, I mean, we want to grow our social presence. So our marketing is very strong and they are our brand as well. So our marketing is based around them. Video creations for the dentist, video questions for the staff. But they then utilise that content on their platforms is absolutely fine because we want to have a synergy. We don’t have we don’t want to say that you can’t grow yours and grow ours. One of my closest Dental has to mean she’s grown with me. Slaney she is a strong Instagram Dental. But when we both when she started out, we were both growing. She was growing in her Instagram platform and we were growing in our brand. And we’ve always said to her we’re not against each other and we have a synergy. And that was so different for her because she said, Majoras, the principles are the same to me. You can’t do this and you can’t post this about us and you can’t post that. And you have to write our logo on that and our logo on that. And I was never like that. I just said to her, will grow you and you’ll do well. And she ended up being full time with us. And she’s trying hard right now.

[00:31:23] And Kathleen is lecturing for me tomorrow. See, it’s a small makeover for four amazing marketing. Amazing. But you know what impresses me, Zabor, is that you mentioned this. There’s a degree of vulnerability in having your associates having such a big presence because they could take they could take their patients away with them. But you don’t see using that as an opportunity.

[00:31:51] Yeah, I Dental. Yeah. And I always say to business, well, we don’t ever see it that way. We always say that we just have confidence. And also there is a confidence in what we do and a confidence in our brand that we’ve seen that the dentist, once they’re in and they experience and touch and feel through and experience the journey with me. I mean, a lot of them, I just feel like the journey is a long term journey that they’re and they’re both in and they feel that it’s not fake and they know that. And the ones that have left or I’m not saying everyone stays with us, it’s all been positive. There’s a reason they want to grow in a different direction. And we’ve been there and I haven’t said or felt your patients are going with your patients. I’ve never felt that. I always feel that that’s enough for everyone. And I don’t need to no one needs to step on each other’s toes. I just have never needed to to feel that.

[00:32:49] I do think that what I see about the brand is that the brand is beyond recognition. A bit like what you said earlier, you didn’t want to build a brand around. A Western defence is right. And I definitely see the the although although the dance is truly inclusive in the market signable, know that the brand is bigger than the clinician, so to speak. And it’s the brand that is front and centre. Yeah, definitely what I see when I see the visuals, the creative and things like that.

[00:33:19] And that’s the intention. I mean, you see big brands out there like, you know, Emirates, business class and Chanel and all these amazing brands. And there’s great people that work behind those brands as well as celebrities that we can endorse those brands. But those brands stand strong for what they are. And that quality and that I feel is unique and not done in the Dental industry. I feel like a lot of the Dental. Principals have had to be handed and their passion is that as well. So there’s a passion of having a lifestyle practise versus a brand, and that’s what I wanted to create. I wanted to create a brand that was scalable and able to withstand that 20, 30 years and say that’s a scalable brand and I still have a strong business portfolio behind it because it’s every sentence has always asked me or we’ve always known associate that says don’t make profit. And I’m like, that’s rubbish because it’s about a brand. It’s not about associate led. Perhaps it’s not. But that’s just the wrong terminology. It’s because because dentistry has never been business let because dentists haven’t been trained as businessmen, just that we’re not trained in business. So unless you are and you then invest in that, I just don’t know how someone can work six days a week clinical and do both. I just think that’s just impossible.

[00:34:40] So what’s the vision moving forward in terms of growing the brand, multiple clinics, 20, 30, 40, some overseas expanding in the U.K., have you got the big audacious goals or anything like that in terms of the big picture vision?

[00:34:59] I mean, to be honest, the vision I had for it evolves every year in a different way because of the business opportunities that come. So I never kind of have a rigid saying this is what I am going to do because some opportunities have come my way. And I never thought I would be doing the Manchester was one one of those. I never thought I would be going into Manchester. The furthest I’ve been is up north is them. So I hadn’t explored much. I didn’t think how can I manage a clinic in Manchester and things like that. But the opportunity with Andy and just knowing Andy and getting to know more and more and the opportunity that came for both of us, you know, it was in the right time and it happened because it was meant to. And I just think that was the best thing that ever happened to me is is meeting Andy and going down that way. So I would say the bigger picture, it’s a lot of clinics. It’s not saying I want to be a Mini Cooper at all. That’s not my intention.

[00:35:55] I want to be a strong brand. And if that means a strong hold of, you know, 10 clinics internationally, nationally, for me, that quality of the clinics is what I want to strive to do, quality and brand and clinical dentistry and to achieve that and have a strong business portfolio, a serious business portfolio behind me, because I’ve seen people come with Dental business plans. I’ve seen people come with other industry plans, you know, in the restaurant industry and retail industry. And I know what a strong business looks like. And I want my practises and my view to have that bond presence. And it won’t just be from the clinics. I do want to broaden it and go through into the consumer brand and look at the academy is launched. So there’s different divisions of Varu that I will probably want to expand more into. A lot is I really enjoy philanthropy and doing things through charity, but want to expand the brand into that way as well. So there’s a lot of things I would love to do, but let’s see how it evolves naturally.

[00:36:55] So there’s about the academies, but we have a couple of guys on yesterday from the small Dental Academy about how that evolved. And then the academy evolved actually around mentoring and training their own Dental from within. Yeah. And opening up to the to the industry. What does your academy do? What’s the plan for it?

[00:37:14] I think the Academy naturally started off because conversations with Andy, I think he was actually doing his own courses. And what we learnt very quickly is the dentist that we do are extremely talented and they love to teach their talent. They love to share it. They want to pass that on. They want to they also have a good time doing that. You know, it’s a break from the clinical industry. And I felt that it would be it’s good to teach and give back. And I feel like we need to be able to have young people reaching out to us and saying, can we shot at your dentist? Can you teach us this? Can you tell us what equipment you’re using and things like that? So I felt like just the demand and also the having the talent of dentists that love to teach as well. It just was a no brainer to say how can we make it work and a good structure. And he’s done teaching before and sometimes the structures worked and hasn’t worked. So he’s had the trial and error and the know how of how to do things. And alongside Kerry, who you know, well, you know, she’s got a lot of knowledge and dentistry and teaching and and how to, you know, where that industry’s going. And so I think that combination is where we went with the teaching. We want it to be different. And the USPI for our academy is not just around doing courses. It will be around, you know, having a database and creating a platform, especially now with covered everything, being more online. We want to have a strong kind of digital aspect that will be part of the academy. And I think that’s what that will be a bit different to. What what we’ve seen that before

[00:38:55] Is a massive asset to you. You know, obviously a lot of interaction with a. Yeah, you know, you talk about a brand so much. What’s your favourite brand?

[00:39:06] What are we talking like, shoes, bags, what we saying?

[00:39:10] I mean, it doesn’t the other than the one you you shop the most from the one you admire the most.

[00:39:18] I would say journey wise, I think the journey of the Emirates brand is really interesting, I think and Virgin that stories and I always look at hospitality industries massively. So their journey and what they’ve done in evolution of business class, first class and all of that, that’s really interested me. So I do admire that. And I do find the other industry is it is a lot it’s really weird, like my husband laugh when he hears this, but the football industry and how I’ve got into, like, learning about how the marketing of that is done and how the coaches work, I mean, that industry in itself is really also interested me, which I didn’t expect to

[00:40:01] Have a favourite brand.

[00:40:04] Yeah. Yeah, of course it through buddy.

[00:40:08] You know, we have some great people working with us that work with Apple and Facebook. And and that was really interesting to hear what Apple are doing as a brand and what they’re going to do. And being at the forefront, I think of tech. One thing that is very different from IFIL is being at the forefront with digital technology in-house and marketing. So we’ve invested heavily in how to make sure that our structures are more digitalised and seamless, as well as, from a marketing perspective, bringing in some of the industry’s best people around me. So I’m working with great content creators as well as, you know, digital strategy. I’ve had someone working for me who did the rebrand with me, who has literally just gone into the depths of it with me in terms of how we can improve from a digital aspect strategically and then bringing on people like you’re saying from great brands like Apple, who’s looked into our analytics and said this is how we should be doing Google, this is how we should be utilising Facebook and Instagram and Ticktock and all these things. And that in itself is so interesting because you have to bring in what other industries are doing because dentistry is behind,

[00:41:20] You know, that’s true. But, you know, being at the forefront, SABERA, you said in the forefront of this, by its very nature, I mean, it’s you end up making some mistakes, right? Of course. And, you know, we have a section in this podcast where we talk about clinical errors, but you’re not doing much clinical errors along the way. What have you learnt from them?

[00:41:42] I think working alongside some of the best people around me has helped me navigate so that I don’t make as many errors, I suppose. And they’re the best in that field and everyone else strengths. And it’s recognising what everyone’s strengths are and utilising them. But I think some of the mistakes that I’ve made maybe in digital as well, is, you know, I worked really closely with the marketing team and we got really excited. And we’re like, this is going to go into this. We’re going to do this. And sometimes their expectations and their knowledge of it isn’t as good as mine. Like, I don’t know, the digital industry. I don’t know how tech is created or how long it takes to do X, Y, Z. So I think my sometimes my mistake is just thinking that my pace is one thing that everyone that works for me you will hear them say is just ridiculous. Like, I will just expect things to think, OK, we need to make a website, let’s do it. It should be done by next week. That’s it. And then I’ll just run with that. Everything I do is run. Those were my mistakes. I learnt on that, set the expectations and understand the timelines because I don’t think my entrepreneurial pace and flair will ever go. And my teams are constantly saying, oh my gosh, she’s on the next thing. But it’s the realistic expectations of other people and what what we need to be doing and then obviously building in my cashflow and my finances around that. So I think that made some mistakes around that. I would say that I’ve learnt just

[00:43:07] What we were talking yesterday with the guys from the small academy and Prav talk about this all the time. Well, you know, the balance of your head has to be in the future. An amount of your head has to be in today. And it’s almost like no leadership and management or whatever operations and in a business development or whatever. Yeah. How how much of your head is in the day to day running of the things is that sounds like not that much of it. Like you’ve got people taking care of that. And how much of it is thinking future what you want to achieve in.

[00:43:43] I think actually you’d be surprised that a lot of it is in that is in the now and I’ve learnt that being the president is everything because that really shapes what’s going to happen. But I think that a lot of my head is in the in the entrepreneurial growth of where I want to be. But actually from a day to day aspect, I’m not doing that every day. I would like to do more, but I think, like we said before, you know, really still in its infancy and the team need me and I I hope they need me more. So but the fact that having a short maternity and just getting back on my cause and being there, you know, that value-add for me, I feel is definitely needed every day and wanted as well. I do see that that I am part of the brand and that the team needs that. It’s not just, you know, patients are so important and giving the patients that flavour of your brand and your quality is everything. But actually for the team, what they need from the brand is me, really. So I’ve got to do that every day in terms of that that leadership, I think that’s so important.

[00:44:50] So how often do you have those conversations with them? I mean,

[00:44:53] So at the moment I probably the structure runs where we now have we’re doing everything now over Zoom’s as well as meetings, but we will meet with different levels of teams. So I would say managers meetings are weekly. Then you have board meetings with the group level. Teams are kind of monthly, but actually group level members. I’m probably speaking to them three or four times a week. So it’s very informal. I’m wearing too many WhatsApp groups and Dental we really need to relax with those. But, you know, we’re always in conversation with them. I think I have a really good relationship with all of them that it’s very informal. It’s like Sabr, we need you for this X, Y, Z, and I’m there.

[00:45:37] It’s so interesting. One thing you said that you’re looking at the 20, 30 year long term kind of goals of two, three years. And now, I mean, we were saying before, it feels like you’ve been around for longer than two does. There was the knee injury, but just as a brand, just as a brand, really just seems like it’s been there a long, long time. Yeah. And that’s testament to the quality of the I guess, the content to mean at the end of the day and Prav of seeing the content more than anything else. So on a operational basis, you’ve got this so many things going on. And you mentioned Lindsey, you’re right. What you reckon is going to happen. I mean, is it scalable to have one one to one conversations with with so many of your staff members so often? I mean I

[00:46:34] Mean, no, I mean, the Internet is there’s elements of I’ve seen that with my dad growing. You’re not going to get to a point where you’re in a scalable position and doing all of that all the time. That’s not a realistic expectation. And also it’s not healthy. I wouldn’t be able to have a good balance between being a mom as well, but I feel like it is scalable for the right people. You know, I call them my jams at group level and they really are my gems. All the girls and all the team members, they all have a value add. And that’s what’s scalable, because once I find those little gems and they have their little strengths and they all work together, well, that’s already starting to scale. We didn’t have that. We had one person and me and then we had three people and me at group level. Now we have six, seven people at group level and that is already scaling and we’ve got three clinics. So then it’s just and then it’s also bringing in industry experts, other industry experts that we don’t need in-house. We have a marketing team that’s strategically built around people that are not in the industry, but they are value adding massively and are heavily invested into the clinic. So I do see it scalable. I think obviously it’s certainly want me, but their value in their passion and their belief in now, you know, once they have that, then they’re scalable in themselves.

[00:48:02] Say they’re just going down to basically you day in, day out. I mean, what’s what’s a day in the life time you wake up? I go to bed. What happens between a typical week time with the kids? Yeah, like cold and Zoom’s of meetings and strategy and all the rest of it. Just just walk us through what it’s like living in your shoes.

[00:48:26] I mean, every day is different, isn’t it? When you’ve got three little kids and three practises, you don’t know what’s coming your way. You know, especially the clinics and the kids is so unpredictable. But I like to have my structure. I have structure in my routine. My kids need that. And also I need that. So I I suppose. My main thing is my fight. He’s only five, Ryan and Zachariah will be three and nine is only five weeks. So within the boys, they have a good structure in their routine. So my day is revolving around what their routine is, but I create their routine. So it works around me so that once they get to school, if I’m I’m going to the clinics, it’s a different thing. If I’m at home and working from home, it’s different. So my calls roughly will be going between 10 and three and

[00:49:15] Four times a week.

[00:49:16] So I wake up not early enough, but with an I am up like five thirty six, so I’m up. And then, you know, it’s all a bit different because I’ve got a newborn and I’m nothing at the moment. So it’s all a bit up in there. But I try to wake up so that the kids are prepped and ready to go for school. But I have a fantastic support system of my husband and my nanny around me. So I can’t just say I do this all by itself. It sounds way too crazy and it’s such a hands on dad, so it really helps me. So our life is actually revolve like a tag team. When he needs to be in the clinic, he’s clinical. I’m doing the morning shift stuff and then he’s out and vice versa. So it’s always one of us doing the kids and then yeah, between ten and I’d say two, three. That’s when I’m pretty much heavy on cause. And it’s not just clinical cause a lot of my calls are legal financial investor calls. So I have a lot of business stuff. Like you said, the brand grew very big in the short space of time that, you know, all these things and structures from a business and legality perspective, I’m now literally just putting into place because we didn’t need them before. So there’s a lot of that going on in what I do.

[00:50:29] And then I will catch up throughout the day when I’m with the kids, I try to be present with the kids and not be on my phone. I think that’s one learning thing that me and I both are trying to, you know, that’s something that’s an error. And we need to fix in terms of how do we have to work life balance, because when the team need us, we might be with children and, you know, our attention is not there. So it’s a bit of that. And then, you know, kids are coming home at three o’clock. By that time, I’m with them. So I try to keep up with them once they’re asleep by seven. I have about two, three hours. That’s when I get back on my laptop and finish my work. So I’m usually my follow ups are done in the evening. So a lot of my team at all the emails, maybe 12:00, 1:00 a.m., 2:00 a.m. and they’re like, oh my God, what she’s doing don’t need to reply. Some of them have actually replied, no, you don’t need to reply. I’m just doing it when I can do it. So my routine is is very different. And it just has evolved because we’ve had to be a tag team and have young kids waking up. You know, my kids are really bad sleepers. You know, it’s just hard.

[00:51:32] See, from about 6am to midnight. One o’clock.

[00:51:36] Yeah, probably Brisas earlier. He’s like, oh, about five and he’s like five AM club. So he’s like, you’re really not waking up early enough.

[00:51:46] There is also involved in the management side or is he more clinical.

[00:51:49] He’s more clinical. He’s heavily clinical. He works in the clinics, all three clinics, but he’s kind of the right hand person for me in terms of mentorship and advice. He knows everything, the ins and outs with the clinic. But I always get his perspective because it always helps me because he knows the clinical perspective. So managing perspective and business is very different. So it works well. So he’ll always have that advisory input. But via me, all the girls, you know, he’s quite close to the group level team as well. So he hasn’t got much time to do both. He’s so clinical.

[00:52:26] You seem so confident with it. I mean, I don’t mean your demeanour. I mean I mean just the moves you’re making, the way the way you’re going forward. What keeps you up at night apart from the babies? I mean, what worries you about the business? Which what’s your worst nightmare?

[00:52:45] My worst nightmare is myself, what I can give, because my ambitions and my an entrepreneur like blood even worries me. And I’m like, why am I doing this to myself? You need to relax. And that’s what like I say, because, like, I am obsessed. Like I can’t sleep at night because I’m thinking of the next big thing. I’m I’m not even the next big thing. I’m thinking of the next thing. And I take it so personal, I take it to heart. There’s something that’s happening, even if it’s like negotiating deals with certain things, even if it’s a clinical thing, even if it’s a patient problem, you know, those things affect you because when it’s your own business, they do keep you up at night. They do

[00:53:26] Sleep. But element of I’ve got some friends with super successful parents. There’s an element of you you need to prove yourself. Because because, you know, super successful, I’ve

[00:53:38] Never had that from them, though, like they never did it for me. From you, I think it’s probably for myself that I do want. I think I was in awe of my dad and uncle, of how they did what they did and how they did it and the buzz that it gives. It’s a bit of an addiction and it’s I can see it in my dad now. He moved. He’s moved. He lives in Dubai now, but he had to move because he couldn’t stop. And he’s working there now. And he’s expanded Khattak in Dubai just to be able to retire in Dubai. So I just think there’s an element of you are addicted. It’s it’s an obsession. And that buzz that you get, I think it just wrapped up for me. And I wanted to have what they had in terms of that, that because of what they got from what they love to do. And if you love what you do that much, your journey is so fun. It’s just so fun. Like it’s not work. It’s really not work like me. And I have to say to each other, let’s stop talking about work. We really need to consciously do it because it’s we don’t see it like that.

[00:54:48] You mentioned your mom was was taking the personal development course. What was her role in growing up and was involved in the business side as well.

[00:54:58] So she wasn’t she my mom actually got married when she was 17. So she actually left halfway through her A-levels, I think. And she then had me at 17, 18, something like that. So she had me young. So she was at home with us. It was a massive household. So she was running the household and it was my dad and uncle that really were the breadwinners and did that. So I then had also a double edged sword because I wanted to be so, so good at my ambition and my career and do all of that. But I had that amazing role model of my mum and aunty who had five, six kids and were amazing mother roles and the way they did that. And then I wanted to be able to do that as well. And I was like, I wanted to be both. And that’s where I was. I really need to find my own way because, you know, my mum always said to me, I didn’t go to uni. I didn’t have work so I could give X, Y, Z, and I’m trying to do everything. So it’s just I have to find my own way as well.

[00:55:59] It’s like, you know, these days we were talking about Sophina Ahmat before these days with technology and one of the things about owning a business and running a business and all three of us in that, you can kind of fix the business around your your lifestyle. Yeah, but but one thing I would say, why is it is a woman thing to many women really beat themselves up over perfection, wanting to be the perfect mother, the perfect businesswoman, you know, all of those things. And for me, it’s like, you know, you were talking about knowing yourself, self-awareness, self-awareness and understanding your imperfections. Yeah, 100 percent knowing knowing what you’re not good and being cool with that, you know, in a way you don’t just improve. But I notice too many, too many women beating themselves up on this subject.

[00:57:01] Yeah, I mean, it is and it’s a massive thing with women, especially like post natally and postnatal depression and mental health for women at the moment is a massive topic and it is massive. But I feel like women put that pressure on themselves more. It’s from themselves. You know, I’m so fortunate I don’t have a husband that’s putting that pressure on me at all. And, you know, it’s all if I’m doing what I want to do. And he’s there to support that. But I think nowadays there are forces that supported by it genuinely from the woman. And I don’t know why we are that way. I think it’s about being the best we can be in ourselves

[00:57:43] As opposed to admirable, right?

[00:57:45] Yeah, I think it is. You know, when you have a child, you know, you want to be the best mother you can be. Yeah. So I said,

[00:57:53] This lady come and lecture in Belfast. She’s about to go on a second maternity. Yeah. Immediately agreed to it, arrange flights as she’s coming in lecturing and going out same day. Yeah. And you know, it’s massively applicable. It is my.

[00:58:10] Yeah she’s great. She you know and I think that strong women around you like me with my maternity and how I am and other women are Dental that work with us Saxenian and I’ve got Lyndsey and I’ve got loads of women around in the room with our working mums. But it’s the passion for what we do. It’s not because we have to do it and it’s not because we will feel like we fail. If we do it, it’s because we enjoy it. And like I said, it’s it is the addiction. And also I feel I’ve always said I feel like I’m a better mum because of what I do, because I feel like I’m a strong role model for my kids and what I do, that work ethic and drive and that graph that they see me do. And also I feel like I’m a more sane person. I have no shame in saying that. Like, I enjoy having my own time, like I want to go out into the world, have grown up conversations and come back to my kids and still have. So it doesn’t make me a bad mum. And, you know, it’s accepting that a lot of women find that hard to even accept, to even say, I want to go out and do something. I want to go out and, you know, and come back and have that time. And I think it’s mentally healthy to you know, some people don’t need to, and that’s okay. But I genuinely, for myself, I need that. I need my mind to be somewhere else and engulfed in something else. Otherwise I’ll be so obsessed with the kids and in an unhealthy way, being too worried about how long they’re eating, sleeping with that. It just it just

[00:59:49] Love that them love that very much. So look, we always end these podcasts on the same on the same note. It’s really around legacy. You’re way too young for this question.

[01:00:03] It makes me feel depressed.

[01:00:06] But several people have pointed out, as you never know in life. Right. So, yeah,

[01:00:12] Of course, you don’t know what’s around the corner. I some

[01:00:14] Final question tends to be Prav

[01:00:17] Or three Zenga. Imagine it was your last day on the planet. You’ve got the other children around you and you need to leave the world by giving them three pieces of wisdom. What would those pieces of advice be?

[01:00:35] It’s really weird because this is the question that I asked my grandparents before when they were quite sick, and I think it would be the same advice that they gave me that I would want to give to my kids, and that would be live every day with your presence. So live happily every day. Don’t ever go to sleep, you know, upset or anything like that, you know, live happy and sorry. I just don’t get emotional. I’ve been thinking of them saying to me, but yeah, I’d live happy and be in your moment and then think, you know, one thing that my grandparents always said is stop overthinking, stop overthinking, stop thinking of things that aren’t happening. You know, the president is actually fine. You’re thinking of things that actually haven’t existed. So that’s one big piece of advice. I think the second piece of advice I would give them is always have respect and love for each other and be close to each other. I think the unity of the family I’ve seen in my own family has been the strength of the whole life. The unity within family bonds is so strong that you don’t really realise the wisdom of what that is and how that really shapes us people.

[01:01:53] And I would give that advice to my kids as well. Keep your unity within your bones strong and just be good to the outside world and just be good people, be kind, be caring and always think of others. I would definitely say that I always think of others and give more without expecting a return. Give more and don’t expect things that you give out of your heart and out of good intention and leave the rest, leaves the rest. If we believe in God, we say I say leave the rest to God. Otherwise leave the rest to your karma and always give more. Give more. If you think you’re going to give and charity, give a little bit more. And if you think you’re going to give someone advice, give a bit more. Just go out of your way to give other people more, because I do feel that that comes back on you. So that would be my advice to my kids.

[01:02:38] A lovely place.

[01:02:40] Thanks for sharing that. And what would you what would you like to see if you were to complete the following sentence? Zabo was don’t how would you like to be remembered?

[01:02:53] Um, just a great mom, a great daughter and a great wife. I think my three major important roles. And then in myself, I would say also to be remembered as an inspiration, inspiration to other women, to other just to everyone, to anyone. That’s part of my journey. Just I’ve touched you. I’ve inspired you, motivate you in some sort of way. So, yeah,

[01:03:22] If I’m on my final question, Xaver, and I know your answer is going to be very different to the boys that we spoke to yesterday. Yeah. I just want you to know that if you have thirty days left, how would you spend it?

[01:03:44] Good, that’s hot. Um, I don’t know, I think I’d want to spend it around my close family. I think you want to be around your family, friends. And, you know, I’d obviously want to spend it in Ruu as well and making sure that that’s all, because I want that to grow and not be because of me. I want that to be strong and a brand because it because of how good that is, not because of the person.

[01:04:15] I can only say it has been inspiring to that and just listening to you, how you handled the whole work life balance, the three kids, the three clinics, and so admirable at such a young age, such

[01:04:30] A young age. I mean, we’re an old Prav, but at such a young age to be doing as much as you’re doing. It’s just it’s just super, super, very inspiring.

[01:04:39] It makes it exciting where we’re going.

[01:04:40] Payman, lovely to have you.

[01:04:44] Thank you so much for having me.

[01:04:46] Thanks so much for doing this piece.

[01:04:50] Dental Leaders the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging Leaders Dental Street. Your house, Payman, Langroudi and Prav Solanki.

[01:05:05] 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 got some value out of it

[01:05:20] If you did get some value out of it. Think about subscribing and if you would share this with a friend who you think might get some value out of it, too. Thank you so, so, so much for listening. Thanks.

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[00:00:00] Obviously, when it comes to implant dentistry, it’s a very critical field if you place your implant one millimetre to labial, the whole thing going to fan and you’re going to get Middleville recession. So it makes or break the case, the correct implant positioning. It’s like domino effect. If the first block isn’t drive, everything else would be wrong. So when it comes to implant dentistry, it’s all about plotting, planning, planning, planning and sharing that plan with your mentor, discussing double checking and having no ego whenever you get ego playing. That’s when things go wrong.

[00:00:44] This is Dental Leaders podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging leaders and dentistry. Your heist’s Payman, Langroudi and Prav Solanki.

[00:01:01] It’s my great pleasure to welcome Hassan McGeary onto the podcast, one of the foremost authorities on implant ology and the country teacher. Been a long time. I’ve watched Hassan from a distance for a long time. Your reputation is growing and growing, but lovely to have you on the show. Hassan, you know this podcast, we try and get to the back story. So let’s start with that. What was your childhood like? Where were you born? What were you like as a kid? Was the first time you looked at dentistry?

[00:01:32] Thank you so much. Payman Prav for the kind invitation privilege to be one of your guests on Dental Leaders podcast. I was born in Malcolm Lancaster, and when I was two or three years old, my parents moved back to Jordan. My dad was a urologist at the time, having his training in England and Scotland. And then I grew up in Jordan, did my high school in Jordan. And I’ve always wanted to be like my dad because for me, my dad is my hero. He’s the one who’s been there for us. He’s the one who’s always, you know, even in the extended family. He’s the one people come to him for his advice. So I’ve always wanted to be a surgeon like him, a urologist even. And I remember when I was 15, 16 years old, I would go and join him in his theatre just to watch him operating. And I did my high school and I’ve applied for medicine and I had to go to university, is accepting me one in Cairo, in Egypt and in Belfast, and obviously I wanted to come to Belfast. And my mom at the time, she didn’t want me to be far away from her. So she sort of convinced me to go to Cairo because it’s only an hour flight from Amman, Jordan, where I grew up in Jordan. It’s a funny story. I landed to Cairo and then the procedure was for me to go to the Jordanian embassy, get my paperwork, and then go to the to the medical school so I can start my journey. Funnily enough, I went to the embassy and I found my papers prepared to go to the Dental school, not medical school.

[00:03:23] And I was a bit upset. And I remember making a bit of a scene in front of the ambassador and the counsellor and even accusing the ambassador of being corrupt person, taking my position in the medical school, passing it to someone else of his relatives and moving me to the Dental school. So the ambassador at the time, actually, he was really nice kind person. He sort of let me talk and talk and talk for long, five minutes. And then at the end he said, Have you finished my son? And I said, Yes, I have. And he was like, Right. Your dad called me two days ago and asked me to move you to the Dental school. And I did this because of your dad’s request. And I was like, oh my God, I literally wish the Earth would just open and swallow me. I’ve felt so embarrassed because I was there full of passion, talking and shouting for five minutes, and then realised that it was my dad who put the request behind the scenes that I’d be moved to the Dental school, not medical school. So I went back and called my dad and said, Dad, why did you do this? And obviously for me, dad is my hero, so I always trust him. But I felt so bad about him doing this behind the scenes. And at the time, he talked to me and he said, Hassan, I know you very well, you’re not going to do well in medical school. You don’t like long surgeries. You are you’re an artistic person. Because when I was young, since I was young, I always like to draw and craft things.

[00:05:04] And, you know, my dad watched me being an artistic person and apparently my dad’s best friend was a dentist. And my dad always admired the lifestyle of that dentist. You know, my dad would be called in the middle of the night to go and see emergency patients and hospital and all that. And somehow I felt he envied his best friend, the dentist. So he made that decision. And obviously, in the Middle Eastern culture, you would respect your dad’s wishes. And John Dentistry in Cairo University, but I always loved surgery, so the first thing I’ve done the moment I finish my dentistry, I’ve sort of written and sent my CVS to Max Fox units in the U.K. and I started my oral surgery training because I wanted to come back to surgery. Funny enough, I worked in hospital for three, No. Four, five years as senior house officer and then as a staffer, great. And I reach a point in my life when I realise I don’t like hospital life. I felt bored. I I felt there was no challenge for me. You know, I didn’t like the fact I had the boss. I don’t like the fact that it’s like six hours. I need to give six week notice before I go on holiday. And I felt that’s not me. So I told my dad, he said, Dad, you know what? You were right. I’m going to go back to my dentist. And the guy just shows you that, you know, parents. No, no. You know, they know us very well. And this is my story.

[00:06:52] What a great story. It’s really interesting what you say that has done. I think me and Payman have been having conversations about bringing up children. Right. And also as a 20 something year olds thinking we would like. Yeah, the whole thing. And Dad would say to me, don’t do this, do that. I’m doing this for your own good, whatever. Yeah, but but then we thought well I thought at the time he was just being an arsehole. OK, that was my brother. In our culture we’ve got the respect and we follow whatever I guess. But looking back, you see all the reasoning behind it and why you’ve ended up where you are and all the rest of it and now is having that conversation with our kids new generation. Things have changed through and you kind of think, I do know that. But for me, I’m thinking they’ve got to figure it out for themselves. They’ve got to make their own mistakes, even though we know what’s what’s right. OK, and in ten years time, I’m going to say I told you so.

[00:07:55] I know. I know. But, you know, I think somehow my dad wanted the best for me and he knew me very well. And interestingly enough, I have my youngest brother. His call on my dad encouraged him to go to urology and he’s now urology urologist, consultant in Germany. So somehow my dad knew that Hasan is better as an artist, as a dentist, while Omar is better as a surgeon, as a urologist. And I respect him for that. I really respect him for that.

[00:08:30] So how sad. By that time that was your move to the UK, right? Doing all that. All surgery.

[00:08:34] Yes. Yes. Back in two thousand and two thousand and one.

[00:08:39] So then were you when you when you thought I’m going to leave hospital dentistry, were you thinking implant surgery, was that a predetermined thing or did you go and start doing some scale and polishers.

[00:08:52] Interesting. One thing, one thing. I mean, don’t get me wrong, when I did my junior training, I did it. I told Royal Infirmary in East Yorkshire and I had an amazing consultant. I still remember him. Chris Blackburn, he was the most human Max Fox consultant you would ever meet. And I enjoyed that. But then I started shadowing one of the other consultants doing Dental implants. And that’s when I start to like doing dental implants. And I remember going back to Jordan in the summer attending some dental implant courses because believe it or not, Dental implants in Jordan were so much more popular than UK in the private practise. And I remember I was very young doing my first dental implant for my mother under supervision of a mentor over there in Jordan. And I thought, this is what I like. You know, the beauty about dental implants. It’s a mix of everything, proper treatment planning, which is to do with dentistry, prosthetic work and then surgery and then a bit of perio management and then bit of mechanics and a bit of prosthodontics planning and such as finishing the cases. So for me, that made sense. A mixture of everything. I like everything. I loved art, dentistry and oral surgery. So yeah, I was kleve. And that’s why the moment I finished my hospital job, I went and joined my MASC at Manchester University. We were the first cohort at the time where we had two fantastic course directors, Paul Coulthart, who’s a maxillofacial surgeon, and Marco Esposito, who’s like a big figure in the world of evidence based implant dentistry.

[00:10:49] You know, people do good things and people marqués positive things when it comes to implant dentistry. He’s written more randomised controlled trials and implant dentistry more than anyone else in the world. So I was lucky to have them both, but I had a clear vision, I now remember my first day in my MCE were going to introduce myself to Marko telling him, Marco, I’m your student in this two year MFC course. And he was like, Hello, my son. And I said, I’m not here for the embassy. I’m here to be like you. I want to be a lecturer. I want to publish. I want to do research. I want to be someone who’s teaching in dentistry just like you. And this is day one, MFC. And he looked at me top to bottom. As a kid, you haven’t even started what you’re talking about. But then this is the thing behind the scenes. Even when I was at high school, I would always go. I was very active as a scout and I always had a passion for teaching leadership. And I love that I used to go and teach English for the younger people. I used to go and teach science. So teaching being been part of my passion all the time. And for me, to be honest, MASC was not a target as much as just a little step towards achieving my passion. And that’s why I did my M.S. and dentistry.

[00:12:21] I had to play some implants and hospitals already or not.

[00:12:25] Yes, but it was completely different to what we do now because, you know, we’re talking about two thousand and five where even Maxford surgeons would just follow the bone. Obviously now implant dentistry is completely different. It’s all about what we call reverse treatment planning. You find the prosthetic envelop, you decide where it’s the ideal position for that perfect restoration. And then you check the bone and the body’s in there. You grow the bone. While in the past it used to be like put an implant wherever the bone is and send best wishes to the prosthodontics. It’s different. It’s different nowadays.

[00:13:08] Hassan, you spoke about your international sort of exposure to implant ology in Amman. And I remember once at the Dubai show, I saw you lecturing there and there was a massive fall. I wanted to have a chat with you about to wake. Wait, I know

[00:13:22] I remember that

[00:13:24] Because so many people were coming up to you, but you’ve got kind of a global angle on implant ology. Where are we now in the UK? Because last time I saw ElectraNet, we had fewer implants going in per head than Germany, France, all of all of Europe. Have we caught up on

[00:13:42] That through my personal

[00:13:47] And we have good with it is what do you guys see as the future? I mean, on the one hand, people are living longer and so they’re going to need more input. On the other hand, people aren’t losing t is implant ology something that’s going to get bigger or smaller ultimately for me?

[00:14:04] Yes. I mean, my personal opinion that UK is still behind compared to the rest of the world when it comes to the number of implants being placed per population. And that’s to do obviously, I think, with the fact we don’t have enough courses training younger people in implant dentistry. The undergrads have very little training on implant dentistry as part of their five year curriculum. And I think people in the UK for a long time being very conservative when it comes to implant dentistry. Having said that, more recently, you could see things are changing. Now, we have great figures in the world of implant dentistry in the U.K., the level of aesthetic implant dentistry is picking up and starting to compete on a global level. And that’s from the quality point of view, from the quantity. Yes, I totally agree with you. We still have huge, huge space for more implants in the UK market. And that’s why I think a young dentist who has passion for surgery to do is to get into implant dentistry and, you know, go to Germany, Italy. Every single practise will have an in-house implant dentist. I don’t think we have this still in the UK. And therefore, I you know, I think for a long time in the UK implant dentistry is going to be a very popular field of dentistry. And also not to mention like people lose teeth, like it or not. And because, as you said, people are living longer now. People are thought to be more aware of their health. In a recent statistics from the American Academy of Dentistry, they said about 70 percent or 65 percent of people who are of our age in the in the early 30s.

[00:16:10] Right. Will this number of people, 65 percent of people in their 40s will lose a single tooth? This is in the States. And I think we could apply the same in UK, if not more. And people are more educated. I start to get people coming to me and say my dentist wanted to give me a bridge. I don’t want to have a bridge. I want to have an input. And you know what? GDC makes it clear, even if you don’t place implants, you should mention as one of the treatment options, otherwise you could be in trouble. So I still believe UK is one of the best places to start and dentistry. And what I like about employing dentistry in UK, unlike Italy, unlike Germany, that we’re focussing on quality, we’re still expensive. So as a dentist, you can still charge more and spend more time with your dentist, with your patient and focus on quality. And actually implant dentistry is much, much cheaper. And obviously, when you do things cheaper, that means you cannot afford giving a lot of time for that specific patient because you have to just do things quicker and that’s where things start to go wrong. Now, I have heard that UK is maybe after Netherland, the second most expensive place to have an implant as a patient, which is good news for us as dentists, because, as I said, it allows us to focus on quality and give our patients the time they need so we can achieve top standards and dentistry.

[00:17:56] So so hasn’t the whole thing about us being behind on implants, the two things that are bouncing around my head and one, you’ve just you’ve just brought to the surface, which is price. And could that be a factor as to the number of implants going into people’s heads? And the second thing is something that resonates with me all the time in any aspects of my life is you don’t know what you don’t know. And so there’s so many dentists out there who see a missing tooth and the only thing they know to prescribe is a bridge or a partial. And this whole thing about actually there’s a lot of dentists out there that don’t even know that’s an option. And certainly in my own clinic, we see a lot of patients that come in with loose dentures. Right. They don’t even know implants exist yet. When you explain to them that you could have an implant, assisted denture or fixed teeth, it’s like you just won the lottery in terms of the excitement on their face, in terms of the possibilities of being able to eat food again, the possibilities of being able to throw away actually. Yeah. How much of how much of this do you think relates to people not knowing, dentists not knowing what they don’t know, patients not knowing what they don’t know and then expense.

[00:19:13] Prav, this is an amazing point, and I’d like to build on this and say it is not an excuse nowadays you cannot be a dentist without building some knowledge about implant dentistry. OK, even if you if you know, it’s not for you, you’re not a surgeon. You don’t want to get involved in implant dentistry. You need to at least build a minimum level of knowledge about implants, dental implants, because as we said, and I know this is a true story, friend of mine, young graduate. So this patient giving him a fantastic three unit bridge, this patient goes down, like to meet his friends in a pub and apparently one of the other friends had an implant. And it’s a true story. Patient comes back after a year complaining to that lady why she didn’t offer him an implant and bless that lady decided to keep it in-house because she knew if he goes to the GDC, she’s in trouble. She decided to pay me to give him an implant instead of his bridge. So it’s happening, you know, so it is not and it’s not an excuse for the dentist, not to mention dental implants nowadays. Now, on the other aspect, I think what’s happening, though, is that people are not comfortable mentioning or talking in detail about dental implants because there is a fine balance between offering to the patients what they need and being. And you don’t want to be seen as a hard sell person. You’re not you know, with dentists we don’t want to sell. And that’s is where things go wrong. I’m talking about over dentures.

[00:20:57] I’m in the middle of preparing a lecture for part of my implant course and it wasn’t over dentures. And whatever you update the lectures, you go on the research. And I found some interesting research showing that, well, number one, we had what we called Magal consensus. So a group of prosthodontics more than ten years ago met in McGill in Canada on a global level. And they decided or they came up with a consensus that the absolute minimum standard of care for someone with a Dental, a lower jaw is to implants and over densha. So between two brackets, giving them a conventional lower Dental is inhuman. This is according to make it now, you might say, oh, these are Canadians. These are Americans. Now, the same group met in York a few years ago and had the second consensus with the British society of prosthodontics, and they confirmed these findings. So I said as a dentist, you should not be offering, according to the Dental literature and evidence based research, he should not be offering lower dentures, conventional dentures to our human patients. That’s No. One further. Furthermore, interestingly, they did a research comparing conventional dentures with implant dentures. And this research basically based on patient satisfaction and meeting expectations. And they found people with lower implantable dentures will have better quality of life, better stomach, better ability to chew and believe it or not, better ability to enjoy sexual activities. So they asked him about that and they said even sexual activities, kissing and all that has improved with people who were restored with improved dentures and a

[00:23:00] Sign

[00:23:02] That, well, the patient surveys, they go to them and they literally they ask them how many times in the last week you you’ve slept with your partner compared to those with conventional dentures. This is evidence based research implants, man, dental and dental implants, nothing else.

[00:23:27] Hassan, I’m just about to change my entire marketing strategy around me.

[00:23:33] I’m happy to share that research with you. And it’s part of my lecture. So, yeah, it’s there.

[00:23:40] Let me ask you something about two things. You’ve got you’ve got you’ve got the students who you teach now. Yeah. And you’ve got the people who like me as a dentist. When I was a dentist, I had absolutely no interest in becoming a surgeon. And that’s the reason I went to dentistry so that I wouldn’t come across surgery. What was the idea? I do. I don’t want to be that guy. So of those two categories and you said especially what you said about the GDC and dentists having to know the basics of implant ology, what are the. The things that a lot of people don’t know about Implant told you that they really should. Let me give you an example in my world. There’s a common myth. All bleaching gels are saying, yeah, yeah. I mean, if once you try three or four or five with 20 years experience, that’s absolutely not true. But on the surface of it, you might think that because they’re named by percentages. So what in your world, first for the group, the choose implant allergy and come in. What’s one misconception they’ve got? And what about the other group who don’t choose it? And what what, what? For instance, I don’t know about grafting teleportation. Is there enough bone there or not.

[00:24:53] So pay if I may just divert the question first into what do we expect from a general dentists in UK to know about implant dentistry? All right. I would like to look at you as a dentist. You have a choice of one out of three levels. Level one, which is the basic minimum level, is to know that dental treatment is a treatment modality and speciality. It’s the treatment option should be mentioned to every patient before having your tooth out, OK, because the last thing you want is coming to you and say, should I have known the implant? Is that expensive, I wouldn’t have had that tooth removed. So it’s something you need to mention even before taking the tooth that OK, you say, right, Mr. Smith, you’re having this, too, that today and your treatment options are Densher pros and cons adhesive breg pros and cons, fixed breg pros and cons, Dental and pros and cons. And there are all or nothing. Exactly. And there are courses out there, whether they’re online or one day or evenings, which will provide you this level of knowledge. OK, so it is not an excuse not to know this. And then level to say, you know what, I have a restorative dentist, I enjoy being a multidisciplinary dentist, but I don’t want to do surgery. So you can choose to restore dental implants and be involved in the planning for dental implant as part of a multidisciplinary case.

[00:26:40] And then level three is to say, do you know what my patients like me, my patient, trust me. And I do mostly every aspect of the of dentistry. So I want to keep my implant patients in-house. And then you could then attend one of these courses, which will teach you from A to Z, like the course we run at the Barrett Academy. We take people assuming they’ve never done a flap or suture in their life, and then we go through an intensive one year course where we go, then take them from basic level to the advanced level, because according to the international team of entomology, which is the biggest global organisation to do with dental implants, the cases are classified into simple or straightforward. Sorry, there’s nothing, nothing simple. Let’s call it straightforward, advanced and complex. The moment you move to the interior region, it’s called advanced. And you and I know most of our patients in the United Kingdom will be more worried about a gap if it’s in the anterior region. So I go and tell my delegates that the bread and butter of dentistry in the United Kingdom at the moment is advanced cases in the anterior region. And that’s why in the course we teach straightfoward an advance in one year, OK, because it’s not fair just to know the straightforward and then struggle later on to learn the advance.

[00:28:15] Now, when we go to your questions, if you go back to your question, people need to understand that the success criteria for dentistry has completely changed since they were first introduced in the mid 80s compared to what we have now in the mid 80s. If their flight is fully integrated and it’s not causing pain and there isn’t massive bone loss or pus discharge, that’s success nowadays. It’s all about the peak. It’s all about the peak aesthetics around the dental implants. So if anything doesn’t look natural and doesn’t integrate with the surrounding soft tissue and bone of the natural teeth, this is failure. And to get into that, you need to follow a strict system. You don’t need to be super experienced to tackle these cases. As long as you have a system you follow without cutting corners, without compromising. And this is where we go. And plus are not all the same, 100 percent in all the same. You know, there are premium and plus systems which have good surfaces, good internal connexion. They give you less leakage and there are cheaper systems which basically you cannot maintain the bone level around them and you cannot maintain healthy soft tissue around them. And obviously there are many other factors such such as patient selection, such as plotty prosthetic, reversible of planning and all these aspects, like

[00:29:51] That’s something that I’m just going to go back to the basic requirements of the GDP. I think what you’re saying is really, really important and it really resonates with conversations I’ve had with a completely different discipline. Orthodontics, right. He says that he will not sit in your chair for a Check-Up unless you have a reasonable basic understanding of orthodontics and how to move all the time. Not not that you can fit Sprocket’s in wires and all the rest of it, but that you will understand the basic concepts and also you understand the teeth are always moving, etc., etc.. And I think you’re probably saying the same thing, that as a general dentist, there is a responsibility to at least understand treatment options, the basics of treatment planning, even if you can’t carry it out. Now, that’s clearly not that’s not happening today. Even a lot of dentists that I speak to today, you mentioned the word orthodontics and instils fear, right. That’s an orthodontist job. You mention the word implants and that’s blood and surgery. And it creates fear amongst some dentists. What do you think needs to change with the curriculum? Make maybe even before postgraduate education right in your site in order to create what I would deem to be a. Complete GDP. OK, well rounded, complete GDP, who would come to the surface to know that actually, you know, if you’ve got a missing tooth, as you said earlier, these your options, if you’re missing all your teeth, is meant to do this. Yeah. What do you think needs to change curriculum wise? Does that need to be like in your one year postgrad fundamental training? Does something need to be introduced at Dental school, a basic level? What are your thoughts on that, being a teacher in the field? What do you think needs to change?

[00:31:53] To be honest, Prav to be fair. I mean, I know the curriculum varies from one Dental school to another. Let’s make that clear. And I know some Dental schools start to integrate more sort of lectures, more focussed on Dental influence. But definitely as a dentist, forget about treatment options. Let’s say, you know, anyone can say, yeah, you’ve got a job, I’m going to send you to unemployment dentists to have a look. But imagine let’s have a scenario. You’re doing a Check-Up, right? And as you do the Check-Up, there are two Dental implants in this patient’s mouth. And somehow you have a duty as a dentist to check is everything OK or not? Because the idea of the check up is prevention better than cure and just pop things at early stage. So you as a dentist, you need to somehow have the knowledge of. Right. What is a successful and what looks like and what is an unhealthy implant looks like. And, you know, it’s a huge debate. Do we probe, do we not probe the how do we know this is Pierrepont Mucositis or per implant itis? Is that implant crowd fully seated or not fully seated? Is it loose? You know, there are so many things as a dentist you need to work on to be able to provide the absolute minimum. And it will be really nice, as you said, if this is a straight forward information are incorporated within the undergrad curriculum,

[00:33:38] Let’s do our bit. Let’s do our bit to to redress that. What do you do? Do you prefer that you are OK?

[00:33:45] This it it depends on which school you belong to. OK, now there is one school which says you should probe because probing is one of the most important things to double check whether the patient has some sort of gum disease about your implant, because bleeding on probing is one of the early signs of disease around the dental implant. Now, the other school says, well, actually, we know that the sulcus around that implant is a very weak sulcus with no proper dates. So if you if you put a carrier probe that you might initiate a trauma and introduce bacteria into the area. So personally, the way I do it, the way I’ve been doing doing it for a long time and teaching, I say we need to use the Perry probe, but rather than go and sort of go epically, I would just get my period in the initial part of the sulcus, which is the one millimetre, and then start to move sort of in circumferential movement, because by doing this, if the gum is not healthy, it will bleed. And that would be a sign. But without needing to disturb the energy he made this Muzzammil attachment or the sort of deep connective tissue attachment. Having said that, what I also do if I see there is a bit of bleeding and I’m a bit worried I would remove my crown and then I will get my period probe and I start checking for loss of attachment around the implant itself in a direct vision. OK, because there is no way you can probe and implant with the tooth on the top or what you do. Are you proposing a metal abutment? Unless you have a fibre optic flexible Perrier probe which goes around the emergence profile of your apartment. So for that reason, nowadays there is a huge shift into screw retained restorations which are easy to retrieve. And then you would go and check the loss of attachment around your Dental itself. But then according to that

[00:36:03] At the top and my qualified to do that or not. Well, this is probably the glass and I refer

[00:36:10] I would say that if there is a bit of bleeding, I would say go to the patient, say, all right, we have. An early sign of gum disease, I think you definitely will need to go and see your dentist, and if anything, I tend to educate my referrals to say, you know what, your life safety net, you just spot things go wrong or just spot things that early stage and leave it for me to treat and manage. Because usually this sort of management is going to be offered complementary to my patients who come on regular basis. So it doesn’t cost us much, but the earlier we intervene, the better.

[00:36:56] And what about what about the maintenance from the hygiene perspective? Do you believe in metal instruments or plastic ones or what?

[00:37:03] Let me tell you something, and this is in agreement with Marcus postictal and another perfect friend and mentor, Crowfoot Bain, who’s a professor I’ve met in Dubai. He used to be the head of the department in Dubai and now moves back to Glasgow. And I’m proud to have him as one of the speakers on our birth course. What we say we would rather have is scratched and clean abutment rather than polished and dirty abutment as simple as that. So for me, cleaning is priority. OK, yes, we do have now a titanium hand scalars which are good. But sometimes if you need to use ultrasonic, I have no issues with using a proper ultrasonic, even with a metal tap. Nice.

[00:37:55] When you have these people on your course. How many was the cohort number.

[00:38:00] Well, I mean, interestingly enough, we used to run one cohort every year and we would go from 15 to 16. And during the lockdown we noticed lots of dentist has made the decision to upscale and all of a sudden our courses start to be such a huge demand. So now we run to cohort’s and we have 20 dentists on each cohort. So we’ve improved the infrastructure. We improve the number of mentors, we increase the number of mentors, and we are running to cohort’s every year. And yeah, we do it one in October, one in January. Usually dentist needs to book one year in advance because our October cohort is fully booked and our January 22 is now half booked.

[00:38:53] So what’s the worst investment in time and money?

[00:38:58] Well, that’s a good question, because there are different courses and one of the main issues, like people want to learn and plans and they don’t know where to go. And for me, you either start right or you don’t start. So there are different courses who have different durations. And then we can talk about another question, MSE or one year course that we can talk about in a few moments now, because, as I said, I made a decision to incorporate straightforward and advanced skills in the one year because I personally feel to be successful and dentists in the private sector, you need to tackle entier cases properly, because what happens is some people go and do the straightforward courses and then they don’t have the skills to tackle anti-terror cases. They still do that and they have failures. So our course is nine modules each module three days, so twenty seven days over a nine month period. And in our course we will provide our delegates with patients and Implats. So as part of the course, each delegate will be allocated patients to treatment plan and then later on to place in place for them and then later on to restore these cases. And then they document the cases and they present it in our final exam, which is an exam we do in front of an external exam.

[00:40:27] Every year we will invite one of the deans, one of the authorities, and implant dentistry in UK as an external examiner just to add validation to the course. And then we have an optional module ten, where we go to Athens for the weekend. And once they develop the knowledge they want, if they want to increase their experience, they come with us to Athens, where each dentist plays more than six to seven, plus get involved in another twenty five implants altogether. On top of that, this is the most important part we have in nationwide mentoring scheme because pay one thing, developing the knowledge and one thing getting the theory and having initial training, unless you start placing importance in your practise, you will never be a successful employer dentist. So we strongly believe in providing mentors who will visit the participants in their own practise, help them to sort of plan, start an entire career within that practise and then we mentor them. Depends on how many level, how many visits they need until we feel they’re safe to go solo.

[00:41:43] So we have this problem now on a composite course that some of the people who come on the course go on and become some of the composite people in the country and others don’t even start their first case. And I see it as a failure of ours, actually, because, I mean, influences are much more involved thing. But if a guy’s been on, by the way, it’s only a two day course. Right. But because being on a two day course with a spend that amount of time with us and then never really took it on, I feel like we made an error, rather, of course, this responsibility on both sides. But what percentage of people are like that with you, dude? What’s it for? Twenty seven days with you. Is there anyone who says, man, it’s not for me.

[00:42:29] I have to be honest with you. We’ve been we’ve been running this course for 11 years now. So this is something we started actually 12 years. We started 2009, as you know, when we started the course. It’s something I started myself and the story came out like I finished my masters. And I have passion for teaching and sharing my knowledge. And I realised there are lots of colleagues who want to learn and plus without going into assignments and thesis. So I started this course with literally five dentists, OK? And then gradually the course starts to grow and it grows by word of mouth. And I have to tell you, so far I only had one delegate who had two in the 11 years to pull out because she had to have the wedding and travel with her husband to another country. So she sort of she didn’t half way through should not continue. But out of the people who continued the course, I can with confidence tell you. Ninety five percent of them are placing implants. And I know this because we follow them up and we have our own WhatsApp group where all our dentists as part of the group and I have it’s in my passion. I keep calling them and checking on them how many cases you’ve done. And we also do every two years like a reunion. So all our best graduates come together for a full day when we do a full day symposium, when they present their cases. And it’s it’s a bit of fun. And when we meet together and we sort of try to develop a community where you finish the course and you get what’s the after sale service, and this is the most important part is the follow up, the encouragement, the mentoring. And, you know, we even try to contact companies and get them special offers. Like that’s the thing people invest in your course, the company or the importers, and they think this is it. They don’t realise, well, actually, they have to invest even afterwards with getting proper care, proper instruments, marketing skills. And that’s what they need to understand. It’s a journey.

[00:44:44] It’s the beginning of the journey.

[00:44:47] Not exactly. Exactly, but with the bird, because we’ve been there for 11 years now, people start to sort of acknowledge the brand and companies come to us and say, right, how we can help you. So like, for example, I’ve got here already offering more than 50 percent discount on our microsurgery kits for our delegates. We’ve got Woodpecker giving us a discount on the merchants. We’ve got Stralman, our fantastic supporter, giving us implants at discounted rate for the bed graduates. So the only way we teach them, but we literally support them to start the career because it is in my best interest that every delegates of my course become a successful dentist. And this is our passion. And this is, I think, what made us special.

[00:45:38] Your passion for this is is obvious, is palpable. You also have the same passion for practise life, of course.

[00:45:47] Yeah.

[00:45:48] Which one do you prefer?

[00:45:51] It’s literally like having two to two sons girlfriends. Yeah, exactly. Because for me I wouldn’t be able to be a good lecturer without a dental practise and I wouldn’t be able to practise well if I wasn’t lecturing. So both motivate me to be a better person because you don’t pay when you lecture, you somehow have this in your subconscious to become a very good clinician because you need to practise what you preach. They go to Dental and if you lecture, you need to have great cases to present. So you know both ways encourage each other.

[00:46:38] Hassan, recently we had a few conversations and what screened out to me, which is totally normal to you, is the way you operate with patients as a team. Right, and associate with an associate lecturer, stroke instructor who has a right hand. I was about to say winchman, but its wing woman and co-pilot, co-pilot, Batman and Robin, as I called it the other day when we spoke. But I guess what really struck out to me is every patient that you treat gets to implant Dentists’ for the price of one, OK, two sets of eyes, et cetera. And I spoke to so many dentists over the last 15 years, I’ve never come across this concept before. So what I’d like you to do is, first of all, tell me about how you met this doctor, right? Yes. Yes. And what really, really struck out to me is that you going up to your mentor when you were doing your mouth and saying, I want to teach, I want to research, I want to do this. Is the story similar? And then how did you become pilot and co-pilot? And sometimes you are a co-pilot, right?

[00:48:03] Oh, yes. Yes, please. So basically, you know, the whole thing goes back to the bare dichotomy, OK, you know, as I said, when I teach, I teach because I want to spread my passion. This is my number one. If you speak to any of our delegates, I’d like to think and they tell me they come and tell me one thing they get from the courts is the passion, OK? And to be honest, what really motivates me to to lecture, to update my lectures, I could be up till midnight, just going to research, to update my lecture. What really motivates me that some of these delegates, they drive all the way from Edinburgh or from Exeter or from Devon to Leeds, so they drive six hours just to come and join my cause. And this is something they do twenty seven times every year. So that motivates me a lot. But then when you find someone who’s willing, not only driving 200 miles. No. To fly like thousand five hundred miles or even more, twenty seven times, that sort of shows you how motivated that person is. And this is the story of Victoria. I mean, we have Victoria and we had other people flying from other countries. But Victoria, the story started. I was lecturing in Bulgaria and she was there as one of the audience and we were talking and she said she wants to become an dentist. And, you know, me being nice, I said, yeah, I’m running an import course and leads by all means you could join. And this conversation was in December, September. Afterwards, she joined the chorus, so she moved to UK and she decided she moved specially to do this course.

[00:50:03] And then she tends to be one of the bright candidates we had. So I offered her a job to be my associate. And at the time I thought, you know, what? Would it be nice to have a younger dentist who can restore my cases? That’s how it started. But then as we progress, I’ve divil of discovery that she’s very good in her perio, in her surgery, as well as her restorative work. And she told me that she loves implants. So now we reach a point where literally we are pilot and co-pilot and we swap that sort of these roles. So sometimes we always do the consultation together. And by doing this, we brainstorm behind the scenes about the best treatment plan for that specific patient. When we do the surgery, we both there. Sometimes she places and I retract and other times I place and she retract. We do the GBR together, we do the soft tissue grafting together, and then we would continue restoring the case as a team. And people like people like it because as you said, somehow they feel safe. They feel comfortable having two dentists discussing the case and getting the best treatment plan for them. It’s a concept, you know, at the beginning, people say, why would you do that? And to be honest now, I highly encourage every single implant dentist to look into this. And this is what we do with Berendt Academy. Now, I encourage all my delegate. To see who is the nearest another bird graduates in their city and do the cases together because the margin of error or the risk of error becomes less and less and less, and it’s a win win for everyone.

[00:51:53] So let let me turn that right. I mean, I think it’s absolutely amazing. And, you know, if I was to get an implant placed in my head to have two highly experienced surgeons, two sets of eyes, two brains, you would just think you’ll get an exceptional value for money. Right. As well as feeling incredibly safe. Does it come at a higher cost than I would go and sort of pay for somebody else in Leeds, for example, to have an implant? I don’t know. We can have the whole conversation about value and everything like that. But let’s let’s treat it like a commodity for now. And I hate doing that. Yeah, that’s a good price.

[00:52:32] Should be higher than delegates for.

[00:52:35] Well, to be honest, Prav and pay. I’m not I’m not the cheapest employed dentist in Leaders. We we we look after our patients. We have special interest in cosmetic and dentistry and we spend good time in surgically managing the soft tissue and prosthetics, managing the soft tissue and getting things look as natural as possible. And because of that, you know, we like to spend good time with our patients. Were never interested in what the efficient implant industry or Quicken 23. Now we like to cook on a slow mode for things to work really well. Having said that, we do immediate loading. So don’t get me wrong, patients sometimes have their immediate loading done and I have special research and rather controlled trials on immediate loading. So I believe in the concept. But what I want to say will not ship. That’s number one. We are good and I’d like to think we are one of the best, but we’re not the cheapest. We’ve never put our prices up because there’s two dentists. I think we’re just more efficient between us to we work at 150 percent efficiency. So sometimes I will be working in one practise and Victoria would be working another practise like the restorative work. But the planning is always done together. And the surgery, we do it together. So if anything, if you want to ask me personally about my records, since my associate joined, my numbers went really doubled, if not tripled, because we are more efficient.

[00:54:20] So Hassan just has to put numbers to this single tooth implant in the back of the mouth, and then they’re going to say it varies from patient to patient and all the rest of it. Just give us a ballpark.

[00:54:31] Ok, I’m going to be honest the way I do it and will happy be happy to share this little tech. I was watching a panorama on BBC and it was to do how restaurants make money. OK. And that changed the way I sell obviously ethically to my patients. They they brought a plate and on that plate they had a bit of rice, beef, chicken salad, bowl of peas, and then went with this plate in the streets to people and say how much you would pay for this meal. And everyone was like 15, 18, 20 pounds. And then they went, they got a tray and a tapas system, like a little plate with rice, little plate with chicken little plate with the same content, but in small plates. And then they went to people say how much you would pay for this tray. And everyone was like five pounds per plate altogether. Five dishes. Twenty five pounds. So that sort of struck me in a way, you know what, you could offer better service and justify what you’re charging. And this is what we do now when we have whenever we want to present a treatment plan, we sort of break every little stage. If I was a patient, I would like to know what I’m paying for. So we do of planning. This will cost much study. Modern Surgical Guide. When it comes to implants, I go and I’m honest with my patients and say, do you know what implants. They’re just like cars. They come in different, makes different prices. And I go and say in the U.K. market there are more than two hundred and make having said that, to keep it easy for our patients, I tell them I’ve shortlisted three systems and I go and say there is a budget system and this will cost fifteen hundred and then there is a middle of the range system which is seventeen fifty, and there is a premium system which is two thousand.

[00:56:29] And then on top of that they will have to pay for the GB ah if needed the soft tissue graft if needed. And the final Quraan which we charge eleven hundred. So I get my patients to get involved in building the case and then them sort of knowing how much they’re paying and what for. And to be honest with a bit of education, I would tell you, ninety five percent of my patients come to me and say, give me the premium system. I don’t mind paying the extra five hundred for the premium system. It’s all about getting them involved. You know, one thing I’ve learnt in implant dentistry, new care, this is what I love about UK. It’s all about involving the patient in the whole journey. You know, I mentor and I mentor internationally as well. Not only in UK. I get invited to mentor in Dubai, the Middle East and sometimes in Croatia, Bulgaria, different countries. One thing I love about UK, the about involving patients in the treatment plan, and this is how it should be. So, yes, for a single molar crown, it can be around three thousand five hundred. For an interior, it can be five hundred. Depends on the case.

[00:57:49] And for me, the what I would look at is two levels rather than three levels. Because with three levels, people tend to go to war for the middle. And, you know, we get this in all sorts of areas and then street. But I like I like what you’re saying there. And how much of your work is actually placing and the clinical side, how much of it is research, how much of it is teaching and how much of it is pre covid travelling? Because I know you travel all over the world lecturing, right?

[00:58:22] Yes. I mean, this is what I used to do, pre covid and this is what I miss travelling and, you know, just meeting different people, learning from different people. Don’t get me wrong, I still attend courses. I make an effort every year to go at least one or two courses myself to learn. So this is very important. And this is you know, I feel it. It’s my responsibility as a teacher to learn more, to bring this knowledge from different countries to my delegates in Leaders or in the U.K. I would say at the moment or three covid, I would say 60 percent to 70 percent towards clinical work and 30 percent between teaching and research. Now, I think it’s the same because the only difference I’m teaching more in the UK compared to what I used to do before. So before I would teach 50 50 International you. Now, just as I said, we have to cohort’s with having more courses running. So covid helped bend. If anything covid made better the better academy so allowed me to focus more on Berridge Academy.

[00:59:42] Cozart, you have a tick account.

[00:59:45] No, you know my daughter has one.

[00:59:48] So you have Instagram.

[00:59:50] Yes, I have an Instagram and

[00:59:53] The social media and Yeoval.

[00:59:56] Oh yes. Social media is like a double edged sword for me. Social media, I have to be honest. Social media helped me a lot and helped Barrett a lot because literally, believe it or not, for the last two years, the the bird academy work tripled at very little marketing needed because thanks to social media, whenever and if the dentist’s girls say, I’m looking for an implant cause my delegates have the passion towards the cause, they go and start to write about the cause. And I people say, will we join your cause because we feel the passion from your graduates. It must be really good for them to write that. So social media helped me a lot. Having said that, social media did hurt me a few times. I know I am an opinionated person when it comes to implant dentistry. I’m a biology driven and dentists and I believe in certain things and I believe in research. And and I’ve noticed sometimes we have what we call now the University of Facebook, where people show things and mislead others. And I don’t like that. And sometimes I put my opinion and people don’t like it. Another thing, you know, sometimes, you know, as any other business, you will have some differences or some disagreements. And what happened over the years, more than one occasion where the other party decided to take their disagreement to social media and the problem with social media, it’s given a platform to people to write anything they want without being questioned. And obviously, it is a common mistake where people jump to conclusions. So, yeah, social media did hurt me a few times. But you know what? It taught me to have a broad shoulders be above it and not go down to the level and start sort of arguing and all that. And, yeah, you know, it’s it’s just so it’s a double edged sword for me.

[01:02:08] I said, let’s take this conversation to work life balance and just more about who are you, what do you do, what’s your typical day? What time do you wake up? What’s a typical week for you? You mentioned your daughter earlier. How does this all feature in in the busy life of a Olympian’s surgeon like yourself who’s teaching and running your clinics, et cetera, et cetera? Just tell us a little bit more about you.

[01:02:34] I’m a person who sleeps very little. I usually go to bed around midnight and wake up around half past 6:00 in the morning. So this is somewhat this what I’ve been doing for a long, long time. Wake up in the early morning and an idea of what I would do some work. I haven’t done any recently, but that’s what I would do. I have my little son when he’s eight and usually me and him are up before everyone else in the house. So this is our half an hour time or our one hour time where we spend time together either on his Lego or him showing me what he’s done on his YouTube channel or whatever. He’s very, very clever young boy. So this is one hour we spent together. And then obviously I go to work and I’m lucky because I have my associate. I don’t need to be there always like nine o’clock sharp. So sometimes, like today I’m going to be there at ten o’clock. It’s OK because I know my patients are safe with my associate, Victoria. I work till eight, maybe around seven.

[01:03:46] And then the evening I try my best to keep it from my family. And this is where things go wrong sometimes because, you know, by the time you want to read research or update the lectures, you know, I feel I’m not giving enough time to my family. And if you ask me one thing I regret and I want to change and improve is to give time to my family. I have two daughters as well. One of them is 18, doing her A-levels and another one is 15. The eleventh one is autistic. She DROs, she paints. She’s amazing. Lana and Janša, she’s into sports. She plays for netball, leads a netball Yorkshire. So I go and watch her playing a few times. So yeah, this is my family and obviously my wife who’s who’s an ex dentist. She made a decision not to practise and just focus on the family. And if it wasn’t for her, I wouldn’t be able to do what I’m doing. I’d like to think I’m balancing things, but I know I need to spend more time with the family husband.

[01:04:53] Tell me about a situation where this balance really came, was really, really loud to you in your mind or your head or whatever. I’ll give you an example and just see if it resonates with you. And it’s the for me, it was the social media side of things. Right. And I was I was watching TV with my daughter, but I wasn’t. And I had my phone in my hand. Yeah. And I was responding to a message that someone sent to me. And that message was so important that it was more important than watching TV with my daughter. At least that’s what I thought. And she touched the phone out of my hand and said to me, Daddy, put your phone away. And I said, 3:00 a.m. telling me that right at my house. Yeah. That’s when I realised actually what I was doing. And it’s a constant challenge trying to strike that balance when you’re running businesses, when you’re trying to provide a service and be responsive to people. Have you got any examples like that that you could share with those of similar episodes where where the work life balance is just sort of struck a chord?

[01:06:02] This is the painful part, is that, you know, we all are guilty, you know. Yeah, I would be having dinner with them. And, you know, people who know me very well, they tell me I’m addicted to my phone. And this is you know, it’s a disease. I think it’s a disease. I get my my best friend’s, my wife, my children. They tell me, Hassan, you’re addicted to your phone. And I would be having dinner. And without even me knowing or noticing, I would be checking my phone and just a couple of times my little own, he would hide the phone from me, literally hide it. So if I press my phone and then everyone would start laughing at me and say, oh, have you met your best friend or something like that? So you’re right. I think I think it is a big mistake and it’s something I’m still guilty of and I need to work hard on, you know, getting that balance right. But then. You know what I’m sure you share with me? We have this passion of giving and being great and doing this, you know, we’ve got energy inside us and that sometimes disturb the balance.

[01:07:21] And, you know, I struggle with that right a lot. And the counter argument is that there are times where that energy and that passion and everything needs to be directed to the people who will be there for you if you were ill and if you were in hospital or whatever that is, those people who would be there caring for you. And so I still do. I have techniques to to help me with it, but I often falter as well as it is some quite passionate about because I’m just like you, quite guilty of doing what you’ve just done.

[01:07:56] You think you don’t need to punish yourselves about this anywhere near as much as you are Prav Prav especially not punishing myself. Let me go. When you when you were a kid and you were having dinner with your dad around that table and he didn’t have a phone here, I’m sorry to have to break this to you now, Prav. He wasn’t one hundred percent thinking about you. Doesn’t have a phone call about other things to

[01:08:26] Somebody, you know,

[01:08:30] Listen to love.

[01:08:31] So let’s let’s blame it on technology and on the era. We’re living in

[01:08:35] An orderly manner and get through.

[01:08:41] And, you know,

[01:08:43] Guys, it’s.

[01:08:44] Yeah, yeah. No, no. Absolutely. Absolutely. No, you’re right. You’re right,

[01:08:48] Alhassan. It’s nice to hear from someone who’s so accomplished as you that you’ve made some mistakes and we’ve all made mistakes. But but on this show, we like to talk about the clinical errors and what other people can learn, what you learn from a clinical error and what obviously other people can learn from that. Can you think of.

[01:09:07] Yeah, I obviously we all majorettes, we wouldn’t be humans if we didn’t make errors. And, you know, one thing talking about the pilot co-pilot concept is all about, you know, what can we do to make it better for our patients? And I again, you know, if I want to take one, send one take home message to my friends and colleagues is please think about working as a team. It does help. It does help. You know, let’s put our egos down and think, you know, working as a team. One thing I really regret and it really hasn’t hurt me for a long time. I treated this lady. She was my number two patient in UK, in the private sector. And I had a mentor and I invited someone who I used to think he’s a great person because I was very young and he was very popular. I paid him from my own share as an as an associate to come and deal with me that Saturday. And I treated this lady. And now, you know, fifteen years on, I realised that that mentor was literally standing there doing nothing. I he sort of supervised my errors. I placed and put in the wrong direction a place in place to labial. And the patient ended with recession and with metal display. And it sucked because I thought I had my safety net behind my shoulder and I realised now that he didn’t do a good job.

[01:10:51] So that sort of, again, motivated me. When I accept to mentor someone, I take it there seriously. I’m there 100 percent as if this is my patient. And that’s what every mentor needs to do. You know, it it saddens me to see people claiming to be mentors when they’re not ready to be mentors. And when I say ready to be mentor, not only clinically, but you need to have the passion and the patience to be there as a teacher, which is harder than being just a clinician. So that’s something I would, you know, I would regret doing, not knowing the right people to teach me and learning and then teach me how to do things at the very beginning. Obviously, when it comes to implant dentistry pay, it’s very critical field. If you place your implant one millimetre to labial, the whole thing in a film and you’re going to get Middleville recession. So it makes or break the case, the correct positioning. It’s like dominoes effect. If the first block isn’t right, everything else would be wrong. So when it comes to applying dentistry, it’s all about plotting, planning, planning, planning and. Sharing that plan with your mentor, discussing double checking and having no ego, whenever you get ego playing, that’s when things go wrong.

[01:12:17] So, I mean, do you forgive me for not understanding things correctly, but in a surgical sense? Yeah. Does that when you when you when you use that, does that mean the placement now is taken care of?

[01:12:30] Well, provided the planning was done right. Surgical guide, if it’s surgically if it’s ready, graphically designed or digitally designed. Yeah. It’s literally a sleeve showing you where to put the implant as per your virtual planning.

[01:12:45] So I go

[01:12:47] And mentor people where virtually they plan things wrong. So the guy is going to show them I’ll make the place implants wrong. So so it’s all about the biology, the understanding and then sort of planning things. Right. And obviously decision making that implant dentistry. We can have a full hour talking about which bone graft material you need to use. Are we going to use the one which Facebook recommended or the one which evidence based research showing it works? And for what uses there is no one magic powder you could not use. You know, how do I know that this person isn’t a good employee, dentist or not? If I go and see that they have one bone graft material and one implement design in the cupboard, you know that this person has developed a proper knowledge in implant dentistry.

[01:13:45] It’s different levels, isn’t it? This is as you get to that higher level, you know, um, well, we like to end this on the same question every time as I know you’re pushed for time.

[01:13:59] Prav guy I get away with Passan.

[01:14:04] Imagine it’s your final day on the planet and you’ve got your you’ve got your kids around you and you need to leave them with three pieces of mentoring, advice, wisdom. Call it whatever you want. What would they be.

[01:14:21] Right. OK, my first one, and this is something I’ve been telling my daughter now who’s just turned 18 and my friends as well, you need to be the reason of your happiness. Never, ever allow anyone to be the reason of your happiness. Because the moment you start relying on other people for your happiness, this is when. You might get disappointed in life and then I’ve seen people getting too close to to giving up because they get disappointed by others. So you need to be number one reason for your happiness. That’s my first advice.

[01:15:06] Great advice. Great advice.

[01:15:09] Number two advice. Be humble and kind. You know, ego will do nothing other than just destroying you and making the nice people run away from you. So, you know, just no need for ego in this life. And number three, be an honest person, you know, just be an honest person. And it doesn’t cost much to be kind.

[01:15:38] Very nice.

[01:15:40] And how would you like to be remembered? So Hassan was and then complete the sentence. What would you like your legacy to be?

[01:15:52] Can I be honest with you, because I’ve been listening to your podcasts over the last few weeks and I have seen, you know, you always ask this question to people and, you know, different people give you different answers. Sure. But, you know what? Would it be bad if I say I don’t care?

[01:16:14] You can I can

[01:16:16] Say a lot of people will remember me. I don’t care how would people remembered me after I die, I would care more how people feel about me when I’m alive. This is what I want to do, you know, I think I think I want to be good to people now when I’m alive, I really don’t care what they think of me when I’m when I’m dead.

[01:16:42] And so I just you know,

[01:16:46] I just, you know,

[01:16:49] I like that. So while you’re here, what would you like people to see?

[01:16:58] I like them to know and I like them, I like them, you know, I like them to know that everything I do is out of passion, of honesty and out of kindness. I mean, sometimes I’m human and, you know, I do errors. I never aim to upset another person. I never aim to fall out with another person. People fall out with me for stupid reasons, and I reach out and say, listen, it’s not worth it. But then their egos top them, you know, accepting that I’m really you know, I really don’t want to fall out with people. I don’t want to upset people. Life is too short to worry about that. I think we should all be happy and kind to each other.

[01:17:50] Oh, lovely hustle. And I don’t think that resonates with these three pieces of advice that you’d give out. Right. Is that is that’s pretty much how you live your life and want to want to be known. Now, imagine you have 30 days left and you had your health and everything in sight for those 30 days. How would you spend it?

[01:18:12] I would spend them with the people I care about and the people who care about me the most, my mom, my dad, my family and my best friends. I would I would be happy, I, I would do everything to make them happy and just enjoy life, I might do one or two lectures because I love lecturing. When I do this as I am, I do this one last implant case because I enjoy my clinical implant dentistry

[01:18:47] And I like that.

[01:18:50] But I know what I would have my fun with me as well because I’m still addicted.

[01:18:57] Need to have some beautiful eyes and thank you so much for your time. It’s been incredibly insightful, not just not just on the personal level, but also the unique way you do things. Right. And the bits of knowledge you’ve just shared with us today, I think would be very useful for anyone listening. So thank you. Thank you.

[01:19:15] So thank you. It’s a great privilege to be here with you. And thank you so much for the kind invitation. It means a lot. Thank you so much.

[01:19:22] Thank you very much.

[01:19:25] This is Dental Leaders, the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging leaders on the street.

[01:19:36] Your house, Payman, Langroudi and Prav Solanki.

[01:19:41] 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

[01:19:56] If you did get some value out of it. Think about subscribing and if you would share this with a friend who you think might get some value out of it, too. Thank you so, so, so much for listening. Thanks.

[01:20:06] And don’t forget our six star rating.

[00:00:00] The thing is, with a lot of these a lot of young dentists, they sort of sometimes want to get on the practise ladder just to have that sort of practise underneath the belt and just say, I own a practise and we’re trying to try to help spread the knowledge and say, look, guys, it’s about you have to your wife has to be really, really on point when you’re buying a practise. You have to do it for the right reasons. And, you know, I’ve I’ve had a lot of friends who bought practises and paid a lot of money for practises and are sort of in those practises six days a week, eight to eight, you know, and struggling. So one thing we say is, look, we’re here will help mentor you. Be that just for advice or if you want to come on board, come on board. Because we like doing things with the people together. We will go on a journey. Everyone grows at the same time.

[00:00:46] This is Dental Leaders podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging leaders and dentistry. Your heist’s Payman Langroudi, I’m Prav Solanki,

[00:01:03] It gives me great pleasure to introduce the founders of the Smile Dental Academy on the small clinic group Djenne Encash. We originally thought you two were brothers, but just correctors. Who’s involved in this group? How did this relationship start? Mioshi BackStory. Fantastic. Thank you. To pay Prav for the invitation. This is something which have been planning for over a year now and it’s kind of nice to get together, even though it’s virtual to catch up. And again, the whole small group of small Academi side near the university where I met K’iche So you might as well be my brother. The amount of time you spent at my house in Camden and the three of us and most of myself and my real brother, three of us involved in the whole group itself.

[00:01:45] Yeah, that’s right. So myself and Jin met on the very first day of university back at King’s College, London, nearly 18 years ago, and he was pretty much the first person I met within a minute. You know, Jin Jin can talk, he can talk a lot. And within a minute he told me that he is a DJ and that he does not drink. So I was like, listen, I’m about to embark on my university life. This guy can get me into all the clubs I’ve got guaranteed right home as well. So, you know,

[00:02:15] We kind of hit it off. Right? That’s funny, because I met my partner on the first day of university as well. So thirty years ago, time flies, but so where did you grow up?

[00:02:29] So I grew up in central London, in Camden and spent all my life in London. And K’iche was in northwest London.

[00:02:35] Yeah. So since I have been there my whole life

[00:02:40] And it’s the first time you thought I would be a dentist.

[00:02:45] I actually do. I mean, back when I was applying for university and thinking of what did you career wise, we had a dentist to does love in Camden and every day, every time you drop in a new car and all energy and bouncing around. So I went to work experience with it and absolutely loved general practise and what he was doing. I actually love the fact, you know, the variety of stuff you could do. And that’s that’s where it hit me. Look, I thought let’s combine the whole art side, which I loved the creativity with the science side, which is instil in Asian community. And I went on the journey of let’s apply for dentistry. That’s how it started for me. Was there any parental pressure in there that, you know, going into medicine, dentistry or accountancy mean for my dad? It was you know, it was better. You could be one of three things I got without it. He goes, you could be a dentist, doctor or a failure. And I’m like, all I appreciate that, but let’s pick the right one before he beats me. But again, I mean, look, as we all know, in the age of many parents of pharmacists and there was a lot of, you know, sciences and that kind of pressure when we side up and not education, which which which is sort of help me keep focus growing up in Camden kept me away from any wrong crowd as well. And that was for myself.

[00:04:09] Yeah, but it’s similar to, you know, my parents, pharmacists as well. And I think back then it was the case of, you know, look, you’re going to either go into some sort of medicine, pharmacy or dentistry or you’re going to have an accounting background finance. So I was just going up between the two. And, you know, I remember this very clearly. I had a conversation with my cousin, who’s about four years older than me, going through a similar process. He ended up going to the pharmacy and he goes, look, you’re very good with sciences, you’re good with maths. You’re also very artistic. I think dentistry is the right career for you because, you know, once you qualify as a dentist, there’s a whole world of opportunity, not just being a clinician, but also, you know, going through in terms of business teaching. There’s a whole variety of stuff you can do. And I remember that very, very clearly. So I have him to thank for sort of guiding me through that time

[00:05:04] Was always was always that sort of you just talked about business teaching. All of that was that was that very early on part of your game plan. It wasn’t just something that came about. You knew when you were going into dentistry. I’m going to teach. I’m not my own practise and this is going to be my career. You didn’t just think I’m going to be an NHS dentist.

[00:05:25] Not 100 percent. I think we always like to look at the sort of the the biggest picture possible and try and dream as much as you can to sort of achieve as much as you can. And whilst being a being a clinician is a great achievement in itself, you know, I like to sort of diversify. And again, it’s exactly the same. And that’s why we sort of hit it off so well, because our visions are aligned right from the beginning as to where we saw our careers going.

[00:05:51] When did you decide to do business with each other? Was it literally before qualifying?

[00:05:56] So we looked at was a first car. I mean, I sat next to my two group competed as often as well like you. And we I think our journey started with a whole small clinic group of small Academi when we failed. So a lot of people probably don’t know we actually failed our finals and the story I remember on the final day when the results come out at King’s College, those, you know, New Hampshire house, they used to display all the results on the board and in all you this about over two hundred and twenty of us in our yard kings. And in the morning when you get the results all excited. And then I’m looking for my name on the board and I can see it. I could hear someone down the hall call out, Jingjing, come over here, you name it down here. And I thought maybe I made the distinction. Water owners, little did I know the feeling. And I’m finding that I mean, those you know, me from uni, I did used to party law, you know, four nights a week. So me not getting through finally year was probably expected, even though I did work hard. But Keisha’s name was a shock and he always dragged him down. But seeing his name on the show. So it was one

[00:07:11] Of those things on the vacation, you know, is one of those things, I think, you know, you go through something like that and it was it was a big shock. You know, you kind of always expect to just get through the last hurdle. And, you know, you see a lot of your friends graduating and qualifying and then you don’t. But the fact that something felt together, you know, I think I believe it very, very firm. Believe everything happens for a reason. And I think that’s when we sort of sat down and had to re-evaluate and sort of say, look, how are we going to play this and what can we make of it, considering we were set back by six months,

[00:07:47] Just taken taking us back to that day. You saw your name on the board, both of you together. Did you feel like you had to sort of go back and report back to your folks? What was the. Was that a daunting experience in itself? Just just talk us through what was going through your mind at that time, from the moment you got it? What was the first thing that went through through your head? For me, if I failed an exam and had to go back and tell my dad, I mean, look, if I got 97 percent in my maths test, my dad did say what happened to the other three Prav?

[00:08:18] You cannot afford an exam, so you don’t need to worry about it. Tell us, what did you say to your parents? What was the first thing happen?

[00:08:27] Well, I remember quite vividly just getting on the phone and say I just said to my my parents said, look, it’s not good news. I didn’t I didn’t make it. My my mom and dad were when I say we’re really, really shocked because I’ve never felt a single exam during my whole university life and they said something must have gone wrong. I said, listen, this is this is this I didn’t I didn’t make it. So I’m going to be here for another six months. And to be honest, fair play to my parents and my grandparents at the time. You know, I remember very vividly sitting down with them and all that said, listen, this is just a minor setback. You have your whole life ahead of you in life. You’re going to be there’s going to be failures. Not everything is going to go to plan. It’s how you adapt and change and take on that situation that will help you grow. And I remember my grandma said this to me, and it was it was probably the best bit of advice that someone could hear at that point in time because it automatically just lifted me up, made me feel a lot stronger. And I realised that, you know, that’s not that’s not the be all and end all.

[00:09:33] So you did qualify eventually. What happened next? Did you did you end up getting a house job? That’s what I did. It was like a consolation prise in in Cardiff. I mean,

[00:09:45] I think Keesha job lined up. Yeah. If he actually had passed, if both of us would have passed, I don’t think any of this would have been here in our small clinic group, Small Dental Academy, the whole network in the small dream we’ve created, none of it would have been here because Keisha was about to embark on a house job like you pay. Whereabouts was.

[00:10:06] That was up in Elsberry. It was one of the old DPT schemes, so it was a two year, one year community and then another house job. And, you know, I think we would most of them, June would have been a very different pathways if I had gone to plan.

[00:10:20] So then what did you do first? Did you do that?

[00:10:23] Yes. So we were we ended up on the bonus scheme with a great adviser and some great mentors. And fortunately, myself and Jane were placed in two practises with incredible mentors that helped sort of shape our career going forward, you know, and I’m still I still work at that same practise even to this day

[00:10:44] For you both that practise. No, no. Not one to hold the call about who the mentors. And it was the adviser.

[00:10:54] Yes. So I mentor Samir Khan, who again, without him as a mentor, I wouldn’t be here now and again. Look, if I if I pass first time back then, we had our jobs lined up. We had to send our service to every practise. I get a decent job lined up in London, lost. Then I have to do the speed dating, a way of applying for PhD training and ended up in Somalia as practised in North London. By far. The best thing that ever happened to me ever and to me was my trainer and Davinder pal CUNA was our TPD or advisor and again, great mentors, very good friends, and still to this day, helping us, supporting us through our journey as well.

[00:11:36] What were the key lessons you learnt from him?

[00:11:39] The key lessons I learnt was we continue growing, the main advice I gave me was invest in yourself and invest in yourself as a Ph.D. I wasn’t too fast about doing further exams back then or doing a PDF. And you could invest in yourself because that is something which no one can take away from you. And since then, every including some courses continue growing, whether it’s UK, US is competing courses and building up our education. And I think that’s been a phenomenal thing things to us, especially with kishkes mentor as well.

[00:12:14] Yeah, so my mentor, Niccola, go again right from the outset, she shaped my career. She was like, hey, look, you know, you’re going to be working on the NHS. You’re going to be doing private work. One of the most important things that she taught me very early on was, you know, treat your patients the same, whether the NHS private, give everyone the same amount of time. Because, you know, I think that’s that’s sort of something that’s not done in practise as much as it should be. And, you know, you speak to patients, treat them as people. You’re not just focussing upon the teeth. And again, as you said, similar to, you know, Nicola was great in terms of pushing me, saying invest in yourself, keep growing as a clinician, but also explore other opportunities. And one of the most important things for me is that she’s just got an incredible energy, always smiling no matter what happens in life.

[00:13:07] I know she’s a

[00:13:09] She’s got a great energy and positive person. Very, very positive. And that’s one of the most important things that I picked up from her. Just always remain positive no matter what happens.

[00:13:18] I know that you guys now you guys include a bunch dentists and so on. Do you feel like you’re having that down to them or is that something that’s part of your group? Like to get all the people educated, your own people educated properly?

[00:13:32] One hundred percent. That is the main ethos. And main culture we’re trying to create within our group is continue growing. And that’s not exactly the whole academy for AIDS and how we can growing the small group as well with our clinicians.

[00:13:47] That was the first time you put a practise.

[00:13:53] So during my FDA, I means to me was quite instrumental. Show me, you know, the right path and how to grow. And this to me, I used to own a couple of practises used to teach law, was doing a master’s, and I thought, I like this. It’s a nice mix. I like general practise. So let’s see what we can do. So in my FDA, we start viewing practises. So we see Phoenicia VTE study days on a Friday, Saturday night viewings booked in. And I bought my first practise six months after F.T. training with them at six months off their three year old together. Or was that that was the first one I bought with Sowmya and my partner in crime. Had we both got together, three of us. And I know a lot of people thinking you must have known your staff and know your numbers and finances are. But clearly, the bank manager came to the practise to sign the paperwork. Möbius, you walked in a three sits down and Richard goes to be so Geneina what kind of rate you want, variable or fixed? And I genuinely looked at it. I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about. Where do I sign? And again, it was one of those things I any opportunity that I just grabbed it and I was fortunate. I had the right support from the right mentors and just grew on the job.

[00:15:15] Did you get involved?

[00:15:16] Yes, so similar to Gene, I was looking at practises during my FDA, again, as Jim said, like viewing on Friday evening, Saturday, Sundays, and then I speak to Jim Clancy. I knew that this was going through in the background, that we were just talking and we said, look, we should just buy one together. And then a couple of years later, the right opportunity came along and that was in Harro and we ended up buying that one. But again, it took us a little while, just before the right one came along, because it wasn’t just a case of there were so many practises not for sale and it was just picking the right opportunity at the right time.

[00:15:49] What were you looking for, guys? I think that we were quite clear we didn’t want to practise for the sake of having a practise and Prav an umpire, both of rum practise in Paso, the are running them. You want to make sure it makes sense. Now, that means it fits in with your vision of how you want to grow. We used to view practises, beautiful practises that just didn’t fit in with our model of what we’re planning. Some that were made no financial sense. I mean, I might as well open up a corner shop and do that would have been more money. So we had a clear vision how we wanted to grow the practise side and even then the NHS. I played a big role. I mean, we always just a mission. We wanted to grow that side. So that’s what we’re looking at when we first started. And I still remember calling cash up when the Harrow practise came along and I said, look, I’m going into business with your friend and your best friend is something which I would be cautious with. But those, you know, myself and our personalities are like total opposite. And it’s a bit like a yin and yang where Kishwar along and we saw fit so well together. Touchwood Till this day, it’s been the best decision ever. Working together. Yeah.

[00:17:03] Yeah. I totally agree with I think that we had that we had that conversation. I remember it quite clearly and we said, look, this is we’re going into business, but we’re best mates. We do not want this ever to sort of be an issue going forward. And we have very clear sort of open air talks about it all and said, look, we’re going to do this journey. But the most important thing is not about the money. It never has been. It’s about it’s about the journey. It’s about having fun along the way and just trying to be the best that we can be and trying to grow as much as possible. And I don’t think we were so aligned in our vision. We still are that that has been has been just a blessing and it’s been a great journey so far.

[00:17:40] I get asked quite often, you know, June one, you by the practises yourself, why do you do yourself? I’m like a I wouldn’t be here probably myself. No offence, you boys probably wouldn’t have as much hay on my head.

[00:17:52] But the journey

[00:17:55] Has been fun and it’s been jokes. And the thing is doing the journey with your best man, your brother along the way. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not plain sailing all the way, but doing it in a team is where the support’s been. And we can manage our stress levels because we all know, look, Dental Street is super stressful doing in a team of us. We can actually delegate well and grow even more as three business partners. What are your strengths? So like, let’s say in your unique abilities, whatever case yours is in your brothers, what roles do you play differently? Where you play to your strengths is just good. I mean, my main role is growth. I got the energy and I want to see things grow. So I’m pretty much involved with the growth side of the business acquisitions growth internally within the business where my weaknesses, I am not very good at the detail of the finance side, and that’s where cash comes in, making sure the finance side we are on point and making sure it’s all taken over. And then my brother is the best, making sure the whole operation side is working on a daily basis. So my I’m always thinking three steps ahead, looking too far. And then I’m like, OK, we need someone who’s focussing on what’s going on currently. And this is where in a nice way, all three of us come really well together and support each other. So we never feel like we’re trading on each other’s toes, but we literally are filling in the gaps within each other.

[00:19:20] Yeah, I couldn’t agree more with that. I think, again, it’s a case of we all could have kind of understood what our skill sets were and are and and how we can sort of help grow the group in the academy together. And as Jim said, you know, he’s always thinking three to four steps ahead. His head sometimes is focussing on about a thousand different things to sometimes someone’s got to bring him back down and say, listen, listen, we’ve we’re going to focus on this and do this and do that. And I think that’s where this relationship works really, really well, because when all three of us are together, we’re we’re unstoppable. You know, it’s it’s just it’s a force that we you know, we’re going to keep growing. And it’s just fun as well, because we’re not as Jim said, we’re not treading on each other’s toes. And who’s got an incredible ability to sort of manage to the day to day the finer details is, you know, without him, I think pretty much his whole operation would fall apart.

[00:20:14] So these practises, how many of Dental

[00:20:17] We’re on, ten about to complete our 11th and 12th one now.

[00:20:22] These 12 practises, would you say that they’re all similar to each other?

[00:20:28] No, I would say that it’s a mixed bag. I mean, initially, you know, we were we bought a few NHS heavy practises as the group has grown and we’ve got a mixed bag now. So we’ve got mixed practises, fully private practises, one practise that essentially is similar to a squat practise. So this is a mixture.

[00:20:47] And I think when we first started, our vision was, yeah, let’s make every practise feel the same. Look the same will we soon realised is the culture and each practise is values. And then how it all works is totally different. I mean, one of our practises in Felixstowe will never be the same as a practise in Harrow as opposed to practise in Norwich. So what we’ve done is sort of OK, we know what we want from our teams. We know what kind of stuff we want for our patients in terms of care and high quality of care. But we need to adapt that within each site as well. And then some of our practises, you know, we’ve got one of our sites, over 60 members of staff. Now, again, within that is like a little micro community, which you need to manage so you can never make everything the same. And that was one of the things we’re quite conscious about. And hence this whole small clinic group name how it started. We never wanted to lose the practise his original name. So when we took a practise on one of the large ones will staff a large Dental group. I never wanted to go in and make your case a small clinical practise. I wanted to retain that staff a lodge name, wanted to retain the history behind it so patients don’t lose that connexion with the history and the staff there. So we could name the staff a small clinic and that’s how the whole thing started off. It’s a bit of fresh and a bit of the old as well.

[00:22:10] Yeah, I mean, one thing we never do is we never go in and just sort of wipe the slate clean and practise and put our own stamp on it straight away. I think the most important thing is that sometimes when you buy a business in a practise, it is very tempting to almost treat it as a business right off the bat. But what you said, what you don’t realise is that there is a community there and that community is is is so important and we have to nurture and grow a culture within that community and sort of help it help it grow to where our vision is. And so that’s one of the most important things for us, is to retain each practise has its own identity. Even though it’s part of the group, it’s still got its own identity.

[00:22:53] So I’m interested to find out what’s the sort of I guess you’re looking for practise undervalued, you know, compared to what you think you can get out of it. Right. You’re talking about growth. Yeah. So that’s one one aspect. But I mean, but on the other side, you’re talking about the evolution of it rather than revolution, right? You don’t go in there and start changing everything, which makes a lot of sense, which is supersmart. I completely get that. But what is your sort of degree of involvement? How what’s the structure of the place? You’ve got a practise manager, I guess. And then what is it, one of you, or is there like another person before you guys?

[00:23:35] That’s a good question. I mean, if you asked us a year ago how many of your lordship

[00:23:44] For last year, this time last year for

[00:23:46] So we’ve had tremendous growth in the last year with that. And the beauty is with the whole business side, we work quite closely and we’re good friends. You’ve got large corporates who was advising us of how to deal with it. And the biggest struggle is making sure you’ve got the right team. And I think that’s one of the most important things. So we made sure, you know, we’ve got every such practise manager. We’ve got our obsoleted my brother who looks after it. And then we’ve got two younger dentists who we’ve taken on board who are, you know, without them, again, the support they’ve given us and the growth aspect is supporting us on the operations. None of this would function. So we’ve grown a whole subletter, our team with the marketing finance. So we can also you can earn Smash-Up.

[00:24:31] And I remember I remember speaking to Gin Gin. It was March last year. Right. Just as we picked up as a fourth practise. And I said to listen, we’re going to have to grow the team because myself, there’s no way that if we’re going to buy normal practises that will be able to sustain this. You know, there’s only so many hours in the day and we can only be in so many places at one time between the three of us. So we just took a view that we have to keep growing the team. And one thing that we built within each practise is layers so that there is a sort of a chain of communication all the way right through from reception, all the way through to us. And even though that there’s all those layers that everyone has our number, we’re always we’ve got loads of WhatsApp groups with each practise so that any issues, you know, we’re still seeing it. We have that to help and support the whole team. Even though we went from four to ten practises and everything we kind of put into place was when we had a small number of practises so that we could just then apply that as we grow in size.

[00:25:32] What were the growing pains going from, let’s say, for. To tell, right, most going from one to two, you know, I remember, you know, you look at practise one and you think, well, just go and buy practise, too, and I’ll just do double what I’m doing. Right. Just replicate that formula if you go and then you get the biggest shock of your life when you realise that isn’t the case, and then you go to three and so on and so forth. What were the biggest pains that you guys experience going from, let’s say before that you had in the space of the covid pandemic, almost tripling the size of your business? There must have been some some serious growing pains during that time.

[00:26:09] I think there’s a very, very good question, and I think the hardest thing for us, especially breathing during the covid sort of period, is not being able to go physically to the sites. And I think that we’re very hands on in that respect. And I think generally agree with me when I say this is that one of the practises we bought was a fairly private practise was literally we completed one week before Lockton. And we had plans to go up, but they didn’t materialise because of lockdown and obviously we couldn’t meet the team and we could do whatever we do on Zoom. But back then, everyone was still getting a feel for Zoom. And it’s just not the same feeling as going in and sort of having that team meeting, that practise meeting to introduce ourselves what we’re about. So I think that was probably one of the hardest things, not being able to physically be there initially.

[00:26:59] But I just miss giving everyone hugs.

[00:27:02] No, you see, I mean, we

[00:27:09] Were a bit old school and I like, you know, face to face and people feel that energy and vibe when you were there. And when you’re growing to a certain size, you can’t be at every practise. I mean, you can’t clone yourself and go there and do it. So trying to put in structures and processes in place where everyone knows you are there and approachable, but they don’t feel like, you know, going into the practise, that’s things something know, we struggle with along with time, trying to make time to juggle all this and also balance everything with home life, wife, life, kids, everything as well, which for myself, in case the balance of life is super important, I think trying to keep that all in place,

[00:27:50] I, I don’t I’m not I’m not currently running any Dental practises yet. So the three of you can help me with this year. But this isn’t it better to take your four practises and double the output of those four to eight.

[00:28:05] Yeah, yeah. I think you’re right. One of the things which make a good point and I would say is it’s about focussing on making sure your bottom line or your EBITDA net profit is increasing. And that’s one thing we’re quite conscious with, making sure each practises output is increasing. But on the flipside, if a good opportunity comes along, we’re going to take it. And that’s how is a balance of both.

[00:28:31] And again, I totally agree with you pay. I mean, we and so we had four practises for about eight years. So it was one of those things where we really sort of delve straight into all of those practises and, you know, try to make them as efficient and profitable as Jim said, in terms of the bottom line, as much as possible. And only once you’ve sort of been able to do that, that’s when you then feel like finally you’re ready for the next the next step, which is exactly what we decided to do.

[00:29:00] Did you find the pandemic presented opportunities? Lots of opportunities that will happen.

[00:29:06] Yeah, did make it was a super difficult time for all of us. I think the first three or four months and uncertainty and CDO business, whatever happened. But I think once it all kicked in, a lot of the dentists who were already considering retirement coming out of the whole practise. So they just sort of done, you know, secrecy was one issue. And it’s just another issue now is covered. We’re back in. So we sort of thought, look, this opportunity, if we want to grow and the right practise come along, let’s get in there, view them. And that’s what we did, I think you presented. And it still is preventing a lot of opportunity on the practise side because a lot of practise is still up for sale and people wanted to move and shift within the market because when when covid hit and then a few weeks later, the practise is sure. And you said you completed just before on the practise, on the private practise and then shortly after assuming you shut the doors. Yes, I most of that must have been a shocker. Right. And I remember sitting there talking to my co owners of the practise and thinking, holy crap, what the hell are we going to do? How long are we going to be show? Fear just kicks in. Right. And I use. Are you telling me that actually you look at you you when that happened, you guys sat back and thought, right. What can we do during this time? How can we grow? And you essentially triple your business in that time, right? Well, just tell me just talk me through the little conversations you guys were having at that time, because we without putting too fine a point on it, we were crapping ourselves.

[00:30:44] We were the same. I remember that very, very, very vividly speaking to June twenty third of March last year, and we were shut down and meet him just on the phone while Boris Johnson was announcing it. And we was like, right, what are we going to do? And I think, you know, again, we were very fortunate in terms of that practise. In particular Prav the old owners really, really stepped up. And whilst they had sort of, you know, sold the business, they came to the fore and sort of, you know, kind of took the team on board and said, look, we’re here. And they were very, very helpful in terms of guiding the practise during that time, considering that they sold it. But again, at the same time, I remember speaking to Jim and saying, look, you know, this is a very difficult and challenging time for all, but we’ve got to try and make sure two things. One is that we make sure that we look after our staff, which is the most important thing, and our patients. So whatever decisions we make is with their best interests at heart. And at the same time, we’ve got to look forward. Look, take it as an opportunity to sort of look at our business and see how we can modify it, how we can make it better. And if there is an opportunity to grow, if there are opportunities which came along later on, then we we will take those opportunities, but only once we have fully looked after our staff and our patients first.

[00:32:07] Yeah, that was the biggest stress on being spoken with, like. If we got no income coming in, how are we going to pay our staff and I was just passing reference to the families, I’m thinking of their families, kids, bills and stuff. That’s the main stress we had. So I think we’re quite fortunate the way, you know, the furlough scheme and the NHS, I was dealt with, it helped us out. But that was a stress education. The main thing, their life, they stay healthy, their life. Let’s not get too complacent with this covid. And so, Jane, you mentioned earlier about the both of you the balance of work life, family health is super important to both of you. Just talk me through that and how you how you how you manage that with not just the dozen or so practises you’ve got, but with the whole teaching academy and all the rest of it. How do you make that divide? And sort of for me, the hardest thing is being present, right? Because there’s always something going on. And, you know, my little girls want daddy and they don’t care about what’s going on in the business. Right. And the one hundred percent daddy in the room and being present is probably one of the things that I would say I struggle with the most and I make a conscious effort of doing that right.

[00:33:27] And putting things in place to make sure I am present. Just talk me through how you guys make times without that balance. And if you employ any strategies or anything to to bring that old into line, I think I think with what’s happened within our own lives from a young age, the whole practises and academy money was never part of it. And that’s just one of the key things for myself. Missing my brother is never been about money. Money will come if you do things right. And I think from our upbringing, I mean, my parents worked hard and it’s a very traditional Asian community, probably the same. Would you pay as well where they were thinking one day will retire, will enjoy life. And then at the age of 50, my dad’s kidneys went and the kidney transplant mom ended up donating a kidney to I just watching his life and our parents life. And look, we wouldn’t be here without the sacrifices. I mean, we can’t even compare our lives compared to their lives and what they went through. But seeing how they dealt with what happened, I’m like, look, I’m not going to save my energy and save up for one day when I’m 50, 60 to enjoy it. My thing is keep the balance right now in the present. So that means work hard now, but play harder right now as well.

[00:34:42] And that’s something which we’ve sort of instilled within our practises and within the academy. We make sure we’re sending that message where, you know, work hard, but make sure you join life, make sure you’re playing harder. And at the moment, none of us guys are playing hard. I now is a no going out, but you’ve got to make sure you’re enjoying life and making sure your hobbies, whether it be, you know, musical instruments, music for myself or hitting the gym, make sure you get your timing yourself. So one of the things for myself is for me to give energy off to kids and family. I need to be a bit more selfish first, which means I need to be 100 percent recharge 100 percent. Then I can give my energy to other people like a power bank, because what I find is in my family, you know, the three kids, wife, my parents, a lot of you know of the practise are a lot of people want energy. So I need to be one hundred percent before I can give that out. So that means I need to have systems and processes within my day to make sure I get my and I make sure I get my time out my gym time. And I think she’s is very similar. And even he went through a bigger transformation compared to me as well.

[00:35:53] Yeah, I could not agree more. I think that having that time to yourself is hugely important. And as Jim said, so I was I was bordering on one hundred and two CG about five years ago, and I remember this very vividly. I was taking money out of

[00:36:09] Five dollars that was wasn’t pure mask.

[00:36:12] That was a disqualification. But you.

[00:36:21] But look, I was carrying my six month old daughter up the stairs, and that’s when I go out of breath and I said, I can’t live like this. I’ve got to be around for them. I’ve got to give 100 percent, 200 percent to my family. So I went through a whole sort of physical transformation, a physical process, got my training on putting on my diet on point. But that process allowed me to Solanki gave me more structure to life. They sort of gave me the ability to say, look, I can create time, make time for things that are important. And it just sort of helps not only physically, but helped mentally as well. And I think that was a huge thing and sort of making that time for yourself. Sometimes you have to be a little bit selfish in the sense you’ve got to make time for yourself first so that then you can then give that time one hundred percent to others. And that was a huge part of it. And training is still still a huge part of that work life balance for us.

[00:37:13] What does your week look like? Do you still practise dentistry?

[00:37:18] Yes. One of the things we look we’re passionate clinicians. We’ve done a lot of stuff academically as well. So one of the things you want to make sure is to an extent, we continue the clinical and that way we relate to our workforce. So we both do work one day a week at the moment. Currently, the rest of the week is a mixture of teaching and predominantly a management of the practises going through things. That’s pretty much the whole week.

[00:37:44] Yeah. And again, that’s only been possible, though, because we invested very heavily in ourselves as clinicians over the past 13 years, both myself and done master’s in restorative dentistry, done a lot of postgraduate courses, not only in education, but in sort of aesthetic dentistry as well. And that’s allowed us to sort of maintain a level of income as a clinician, but on a like a reduced time frame during the week, because at the moment, neither of us, we don’t draw any sort of wages from the practises. Everything is reinvested in the practise to help the practises grow. So all of our sort of personal earnings go go on our personal life, kids, family life.

[00:38:26] So we have no says what? 13 years ago you finished university. That was 2007. It’s admirable, man, so thoughtful from the practise side was vision.

[00:38:41] The vision is to grow. Yeah, we’ve got to grow. We want to hit about 40 practises in the next few years. Which we’re going to continue. They always say when you dream big, so we dream big, or at least I do, I think it gets a bit more scary, like you come back to Earth and I know we’re going to go for it. Let’s continue on the stage.

[00:39:05] And that’s the beauty of it. Right. So like we said, 40 practises. But again, at the same time, it’s got to be grown in the right way. We’re not just going to buy practises for the sake of buying practises. We only buy practises where the ethos of the seller fits with our ethos in terms of, you know, patients will always come first and their quality of care has to be to the highest of standards. We’ve actually pulled out deals where, you know, the our ethos hasn’t aligned with the seller. I lost quite a lot of money on it. At the end of the day, you know, we want to make sure that when we take over practises, everything is in a similar sort of fashion as to how we would operate it, because, you know, a lot of the sellers still stay on with us. And I think that’s the most important thing. So whilst we have that vision of, you know, 40 practises in the next four years, it’s going to be grown in the right way with all of our practises. Put that patients first

[00:39:55] And you look looking for particular geography or you think in UK, why do you focus on a certain area at the moment? So currently, I mean, all the practises of Southeast London, Suffolk, Essex, Norfolk, Oxfordshire, now we are expanding, going north as well, looking at Birmingham, Midlands, what’s happened in the last, you know, of the young Dental is approaching us saying, look, guys, we really want to buy a practise. Can you support us? Can we get involved? And so that’s something which we’ve now taken on board. Like, I wouldn’t be here without Simeon helping me on my first practise. So one of the things we’ve done quite important is we are open to taking on partners, on board supporting even if someone wants to buy a practise. We recently did a clubhouse talk with a couple of people and we had over one hundred and fifty people in the room. One of the girls was looking to buy a practise. She goes, Guys, you know, can you mentor me looking to buy a practise? I’ll pay for it. I said, Look, I’ll help you more than happy to help you out the next week on the phone to her. And she’s looking to buy a practise. I think it was it was

[00:40:55] It was a story that was thoroughly

[00:40:57] And will help you out, because we’ve learnt a lot of stuff. We’ve made a lot of mistakes. We’ve lost some money as well. Some money comes and goes. I want to make sure everyone learns of each other and they don’t make the same mistakes we did as well.

[00:41:10] So the thing is, with a lot a lot of young dentists, they of sometimes want to get on the practise ladder just to have that sort of practise underneath the belt and just say, I own a practise and we’re trying to try to help spread the knowledge and say, look, guys, it’s about you have to your wife has to be really, really on point. When you’re buying a practise, you have to do it for the right reasons. And, you know, I’ve I’ve had a lot of friends who’ve bought practises and paid a lot of money for practises and are sort of in those practises six days a week, eight to eight and struggling. So one thing we say is, look, we’re here to help mentor you. Be that just for advice or if you want to come on board, come on board, because we like doing things with the people together. We will go on a journey. Everyone grows at the same time.

[00:41:52] You have coaches with you guys. The collaborative side of it is strong. You know, you don’t even though you’ve got a very strong kind of identity. By the way, is that on purpose? You sort of dress the same as this. If that was a strong identity, you haven’t done the thing where you sort of geek out, like keep yourself separate from from the rest of the community that you really do. You’re very collaborative. And that’s really that’s really a good thing to do. It’s really a good sign. A lot of people don’t do that. A lot of people sort of sense themselves off a little bit. Tell me where that came from. And then the other thing we were talking about mistakes. Let’s talk about mistakes. I like mistakes.

[00:42:39] So the whole thing, the Dental world is small. And I would even say the UK Dental world, the international Dental world now is even smaller. And if you want to grow within the Dental market, whether it’s in the academy site or practises, you need to get to know Dentists’. I mean, you need to get to know each other. So one of the things and I think in university, I mean, being a DJ and throwing parties, the networking site came easily to me. I made sure even as VTS we were quite active with Royal College FDP, we used to go to lectures just to get to know people. And, you know, a lot of people inspired us and we looked up to you so that we can, you know, build upon that. And I think that’s quite important to us. Plus, it’s great to see other people grow that I love supporting other clinicians are the businesses within the industry. If someone’s got an idea, we love to see growth and working together with people. That’s what it’s about, because as we say, that money will come and go. And it’s not about that. It’s about the journey with the right people around you and having fun along it.

[00:43:44] But it was one of those things, I think, again, that goes back to sort of mentors when we were in F.T. again, similar sort of ethos, both similar Niccola, great passion, great energy. And also the networks were huge at the time. And again, we sort of without their networks, we wouldn’t be here today because we used we kind of grew those networks ourselves from from them. And I think that from that perspective, they kind of gave us that sort of vision to say, look, you know, don’t do this by yourself, go out, collaborate with people, help people grow, nurture young dentists and help people. Most importantly,

[00:44:20] That’s to stop mistakes. Now, I want both of you to give me one clinical mistake he made and something you learn from that and then one business mistake you made and what you learn from the different. When do we start

[00:44:37] With the critical mistakes? I mean, I’m just all I can think about is my FDA and we used to go out quite often, used to come in the next day. I don’t drink. So luckily I was intoxicated. But whilst drilling, I did put the bar to the floor of the patient’s mouth, slipped, went for the floor, the patient’s mouth. Yeah, that was quickly learnt the importance of a strong finger. Luckily, look managed to do well and to me was there to save the day. But my FDA was full of mistakes. I think clinical mistakes. I mean, you did too many to go through. And I think that the main thing is, as you’re doing in your younger days, have the right support so people can step in and help you out when you do make the mistake and help you and help you grow as well. I think the Freudenberger from the floor of the mouth that was

[00:45:27] Done now for his clinical setting, you can think about your business mistake,

[00:45:33] I think sort of clinical mistake. It’s not so much clinical, but I think one of the most important things I learnt was very early on was assessing the patient. And I think, you know, we can all do treatment to X amount of standard. I think patients always are aware of what’s going on. But for me, I very vividly remember I just started in a in a private practise squat practise. And I was I was pretty I was pretty much it was in my after year and it was one of the first patients that seen I think I got a bit too excited, you know, charging 200 pounds for a composite and the FDA. And and I didn’t really see the patient side of it as much. And, you know, did the work really quickly. Patient walks out and says, how can you charge 200 pounds for that 40 minute appointment? And he was in my mouth for about 15, 20 minutes of that. And what I didn’t realise is that back then and again, this is something that my mentors taught me, is that you’ve got to treat the patient as a whole. You know, it’s not just about the dentistry, and I love that very, very early on, so now it’s and again, it’s never about the money, but you have to we have to understand that for the patient that you’re offering a service, they are paying for that service. And that was the lesson I learnt very, very early on.

[00:46:42] That’s a good one. Let’s move to business and take

[00:46:46] Can

[00:46:49] I you to take, but

[00:46:56] I’ll give you a bit of business mistake. Not so much a mistake. I think circumstances are what they are, but one of our practises we ended up buying in Norfolk and we had a really sad situation where one of the old owners was diagnosed with cancer and one of the major, major providers of the practise. And, you know, the practise sort of went from turning over close to a million pounds to go to half of that within the space of a year because we just couldn’t fulfil the NHS contract side of things. And I think one of the mistakes that we made was probably not having that vision to create contingencies or planning ahead for that sort of situation. And some of it’s out of our hands. We couldn’t obviously you dealt with the cards are dealt with, but I think we probably could have dealt with that better make some contingencies. But again, it’s all about learning from those mistakes. So now one thing that we have got is contingencies across the board to make sure that we are fulfilling the NHS targets, but making sure that patients have that continual access, regardless of whether someone’s there or not. There’s always someone to help fill that, fill the boots.

[00:48:11] Another. I mean, my what I would say is if you’re going to a bank manager’s meeting, there’s about a million quid, they’ll be useful to get the right back manager’s name and the right by name right

[00:48:28] Out

[00:48:30] Already there with our financial director. I walked in obviously 15 minutes late, as I usually do. I assumed it was virgin money because I saw the logo outside walking. I go with Richard Branson. I’m here to get his money. Little did I know it was a totally different bank robbing bank. Romney Yeah,

[00:48:52] Because I’ve done a lot of the chat before then.

[00:48:54] So let’s talk about the academy. What’s what’s the what’s the sort of where did it start and where we are now? How many people you’ve got going through your many, many different causes. I see.

[00:49:10] Yes, I mean, look, we’ve got over one hundred and fifty delegates now enrolled in our courses and the majority of our courses are longitudinal diplomas and it all started in twenty. Eighteen. All right.

[00:49:22] Twenty nineteen and twenty eighteen.

[00:49:26] It started around such a long time.

[00:49:30] We had a number of back then. We had about fifty associates used to work for us and they’re all asking us, Genki, you’ve done a lot of course is what you recommend. Would you recommend. And we’ve done some fantastic courses and I still recommend them based education on let’s try and put something together for our dentist because we’ve got the network back that was meant to be predominantly us teaching it. But then I said to them, you know, why don’t we take it one step further? We’ve got a lot of good contacts with big lecturers, international lecturers. Let’s get them involved. The next thing you know, we thought it’d be quite nice to give the delegates some sort of recognition in terms of let us off the name, some sort of accredited diploma. So we went down that path and that’s how it all started and initially was meant to be just our own dentistry sort spiralled out where we are. So many people wanted to get role. And since that, we our first call was March twenty nineteen Fusako of Diploma of Restorative Anaesthetic and we were on our seventh one now with the implant diploma orthodontic one and don’t daunting one. And what I’m proud of and I think these guys don’t get enough credit is our Dental therapist one, our Dental therapists. I mean firstly fantastic to work with, but the clinical skills shocked me. Some amazing unity.

[00:50:53] We find that on the news for me, Cooper. The therapists are better than the dentists. It’s I don’t know. I think it’s self selecting. The kind of therapist who decides to save the money and come and do the course is really, really key. Yeah, maybe that’s the problem. This place where the people coming from, is it is it like, OK, word of mouth and all that. But, you know, advertising, is it to do with your sort of personal brand and people want to be close to you? Don’t just tell me what you think.

[00:51:28] Yes, I think it’s a mixture. So a lot of it is word of mouth. A lot of it is through the brand itself. And social media has been has been great as well in terms of sort of people sort of seeing myself in a lot of that. The lectures are up to and again, sort of our passion for what we do and how we sort of approach dentistry. And it’s just all about being positive. And most important thing for us is having fun while still learning. And I think that’s a key element for us.

[00:51:56] We get asked of did you know, I mean, there’s so many academies and so many university courses and so many programmes, every one of them is fantastic. It just depends what kind of learning style you like, what kind of education you like, and it’s that environment you fit in with. So that’s why I say, look, try to see what other people do in every one of them has got their own styles, how to do it. And ours is slightly different, whereas, you know, play harder. And that’s how we want to get across to everyone making learning fun. That’s the best way of

[00:52:26] Explaining it to me then. I mean, I know it’s got in the way, but explain that to me. How is you? Of course, more fun than the next one.

[00:52:33] I don’t even want to say fun. I mean, look, we try and make it fun as possible. We got music playing. We’ve got a social happening as well. But our lecturing style as well and our energy that we bring in. So those of you know myself, K’iche, Ali, as well, we’ve got our own style of lecturing as well, which, you know, it’s not for everyone. And that’s the thing I remember being doing our masters and some lectures you warm to some you know, you find it quite difficult. We can all relate to teachers at school as well. You know, those do we can relate to. And it’s about finding who are you going to learn the best from? And one thing we always say is don’t do our courses or any course for CPD or for letters after your name do. So you can really apply the skills and knowledge. The next day I get on many small Makov. You learn composite Monday morning, apply it. And that’s the most important thing, stuff that you can apply that’s relevant to your practise. You have to make it. You know, you should apply.

[00:53:28] Yeah, I mean, every, every sort of Monday night we run like a case clinic for all the delegates, for all the diplomas, for the employment diploma, for the orthodontic diploma, the restorative and also for the therapists. And the reason why we do that is because we really, really want to encourage them to implement what they’re learning in practise. And the only way by doing that is by bringing cases that you’re going to treat and helping support them on planning those cases and executing them. And that’s one thing that we’re very passionate about and we are very adamant about that come on the course. But make sure that you’ve got enough cases that you’re going to get this work so that everything that you’re learning, you’re able to implement in the next day.

[00:54:08] Yeah. So put a bullet point

[00:54:11] When you guys buy a practise and you’ve got a whole bunch of new clinicians on board in the group, is the training part of the package, so to speak, in terms of elevating the standing of that practise? So let’s say I was a dentist working at a practise that you just acquired. Do I get to benefit from the diplomas, et cetera, et cetera? Is this some kind of a deal or is it mandatory? What’s the relationship between the two businesses? That’s good. Mean look, we’ve got certain things that are mandatory in terms of we do our symposiums where four or five times a year we’ve got courses going on on the weekend where it’s composite courses could be a rubber dam course, variety of courses running where, you know, any Dental to come along and learn from from the other side. Would you separate the academy side is something which, you know, delegates do want to do for the education. They’ve got the opportunity where some can do at a discounted rate and some if they go on a salary package, they it could be included as well. So we’ve got a variety of options. And that’s sort of in a way helped making sure that the clinical standards within each practise are to the maximum that can possibly be. And plus all our, you know, clinicians are seeing each other on courses and the continuing growing as well.

[00:55:26] Yeah, just just to go back to that point about a symposium for us that was a really, really important part of of the group and the ethos in terms of the clinical standards of dentistry that we want to try and achieve, because that’s free for the fall of our associates. They come on at four or five times a year. But also it’s really important. It’s sort of a networking event for them as well, because, you know, the practise all over the country in Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, London, Hertfordshire, and we know that sometimes dentistry can get isolating. You know, you’re in your practise six days a week. You don’t get to go out, socialise with other dentists as much as you can, especially if you’re not going on other courses. So one thing for us that was really important was to sort of create that culture within the group where everyone’s on board with sort of investing themselves, learning and trying to excel as a clinician, but at the same time also network together have a little bit of a social life to the day and just to get to meet other people and to share experiences. Hence why we decided to do these small tight-Knit group symposiums every every two or three months.

[00:56:29] How did you manage to trademark smile as a word? How does that.

[00:56:35] I think we trademark these. If we trademark smile. A lot of small things out there.

[00:56:42] Basically, it’s one of those it’s a funny one to pick a as a brand name in dentistry. And my hat’s off to you literally. You’ve. You’ve pulled it off for the the code of practise small groups. How many employees do you guys have now? Over three hundred. Three hundred thousand.

[00:57:16] Yeah, it’s great. It’s great.

[00:57:19] That’s a hell of a beast.

[00:57:21] I’m just like the Christmas party was. And Boris really messed it up for us. I’m looking forward to this one.

[00:57:30] Should be good. What we’re looking to do a here. Right.

[00:57:32] You understand if we’re going out to. So business confidence come from guys,

[00:57:39] What does the confidence come from? I think it’s when you feel like you’re doing the right thing and you’ve been on the right path. Learning dentistry is the one thing I would say is that when we started this, I wanted to know dentistry inside out. I make sure I learnt the clinical we know how practises work. We know the NHS, how the system works and how clinicians work, how the patients see it. So we made sure we learnt everything we can within dentistry. And I think once you’ve got the knowledge that helps with the confidence within it as well. I think our education that we’ve spent a lot of time and money on has helped us with the confidence side as well.

[00:58:14] There’s lots of people, lots of Dental education, right, but they haven’t got three hundred employees. I mean, this notion of we’re going to grow, we’re going to keep going, we’re going to keep loads of people think that. Yeah, but actually executing on it and having the option to keep going and wanting to trace it back to you was to be the confident guy, to become a deejay and all of that. Right. But both of you. Can you trace it back to why didn’t you just buy practise until

[00:58:47] You hit it? Well, I think it’s two things. One is having that growth, but you want to do big things and drive, drive, but you also need to execute properly. And that’s where you know, where privacy avoid the drive always had to drive. Even as university. I was talking to my friends I about 16, 16 year, lowest high school and high school, and we were throwing parties for university students. So we used to go flying disco to kings and throwing parties for university students. So that drives always been there. But I think when K’iche came along, it was the execution part and I think both need to be there. Otherwise, one person is you’re dreaming and planning, but nothing ever gets executed. And I think when both came together, I think that’s where it worked for us.

[00:59:33] No, I couldn’t agree more with that. I think the the beauty of it is that we’ve always said, look, we’ve always got to dream big, but we’ve also been able to execute what we’re dreaming about and sort of and it’s all about timing and execution. But not only that, I think part of the confidence comes around from having the right people around you. You know, I think that’s the massive part of the journey and both myself and just been blessed to have the right people around us at every stage, every stage of our career, not only clinically, but also in terms of business. We’ve had great mentors and military people that sort of lean upon for advice when needed. And that’s still the case. And, you know, we always say whenever the finished article, we’re always learning and that will never stop. So both of us look to the embassy some point again now that we’ve sort of got our clinical side to invest lot of clinically, we’re now looking to grow the business side. And to do that, you have to go through the process of education as well.

[01:00:30] Recommend the NBA guys, if you speak to people who have done them and they want to run GlaxoSmithKline when they come out of it. I just want to work with everyone who’s done what has been done with it. Don’t get me wrong, plenty of people have been happy with it. Even it’s it’s actually brilliant, man. And it’s great. It’s obvious you’re enjoying it. Would you enjoy the most and what benefit would you rather. I know it’s obvious. One of you likes one thing, the other likes the other. What’s your favourite bit of itching? The acquiring.

[01:01:12] Yeah, I mean, I like the growth side, so I love, you know, the whole academy teaching side. I mean, I’m teaching this week in Ipswich for Health Education in England, next week for Birmingham College of Medicine, Dentistry, etc. next week as well. But I like seeing people grow and I like working with people. I like the whole site and I love the acquisition site. That’s predominantly where you know, where my head is that in the with a passion and enjoyment comes for myself.

[01:01:37] Yeah, similar to Jen in terms of acquisition and the growth and also sort of forging relationships, I think that’s been a massive part of being able to do and being able to grow, I think forging relationships with not only sort of banks, but also solicitors and people outside of the clinical remit within dentistry. I think it’s been amazing. And that’s the part that’s something that we both are very, very passionate about. And I really love that part of it, because you meet people of all walks of life and the experiences that you can gain from them is immense.

[01:02:09] Casey, you spoke about your transformation earlier, coming down from a hundred and two kilos, you touched upon confidence, right? I certainly know myself if I’m on my game when it comes to training, eating, diet, if that is bangle my entire life, like my performance in life, whether it’s time with my kids, whether it’s in business, whether it’s talking to clients, whether it’s meeting people, it focuses in centres around a couple of things, Wii and Armatrading. Right. And if those two are in line, everything else and I’ll put my success down to that. And it sounds like a crazy thing to do, especially when you’re talking to someone who the idea of Jim is just foreign. Right. And it just just doesn’t enter into that. So you talk to me about you went from a hundred and two kilos to whatever you are now. How did that transform your life in terms of business, family life, confidence? Socially?

[01:03:08] It was it was huge, had a huge, huge impact. And I think I know General has seen that sort of first hand, the confidence it gives you very much the same Prav if my training is on my diet is on point. Everything else just fits into place in life, not just for work, but most importantly for the family. Your head is in a much better space. And that that gave me a huge amount of confidence. You know, it was one of those things that had been in the back of my mind for such a long time, you know, and being at that sort of that sort of weight and not being in shape, it does affect your confidence 100 percent. You know, it’s one of those things. And it just got to that point for me where I had to make a change and making that change, going through that process gave me a different sort of mental toughness because it gave me the sort of approach in life that I can achieve, anything I put my mind to. And no matter how big that dream is, I can achieve it. Hence, you know, if that’s in business and family, whatever it is, that has been sort of a huge impact on my life personally on that.

[01:04:14] And that trigger was just walking up the steps with you, with your baby feeling just some out of breath. How am I going to run around with my kid,

[01:04:23] You know, pizza three times a week and all that sugar was not doing any favours and let you walking up those steps. And I got to the top and it wasn’t it wasn’t like a long flight of stairs. And I just thought, this is just I cannot live like this. You know, I’ve got to be around for a lot longer. I’ve got a lot more to give. And that’s just what I just needed to make a change.

[01:04:43] I was it black and white for from the moment you made that decision, it was like you did turn to switch on a hundred percent. You can’t go in another direction. Or was there a bit of moderation in between? What was going through your head?

[01:04:55] Now, I’m very much if I put my mind to it, I want to get it done. And for me, it was a three month process. You know, we went through I mean, I started losing a little bit of weight initially, and then I got in touch with with a personal trainer through a company. And I just made a decision that I just wanted to achieve the best physical shape I could possibly achieve and in the shortest amount of time possible. So we did it. I think three months start to finish. But it for me was just a switch, just black and white, just wanted to get it done

[01:05:26] And so forth. Practises on what what’s the next stage? Any physical transformation, Mr. Olympia? Do you think we’ll do

[01:05:40] It together, Prav Keisha’s

[01:05:43] Transformation is on his Instagram if anyone’s not seen it, and I think she’s on only fans as well now.

[01:05:51] Always depend on you for the. But, you know, again, you know, putting that that picture up on Instagram was not an easy task by any stretch of the imagination. But again, I wanted to put it out there because it was more to sort of inspire people to sort of if they’re ever struggling with anything, if you can put your mind to it, you can achieve it. And it’s just about telling them, you know, your wife has to be strong enough. And if your wife is strong enough, you can achieve it 100 percent.

[01:06:19] Well done, trust your justice project of yours might end up with an exit, right? I know you’re way too young to be thinking of it, but but, you know, there is that question. Like, if if there was an exit, let’s say let’s say someone came along and gave you money on your dreams to to walk away. Can you do next?

[01:06:47] That’s the question we keep asking ourselves pretty much every day. I mean, the exit is going to come one day and I’m a bit unpredictable at least. And if the fun goes for me, I might be out tomorrow morning because this process for me has to be fun and enjoyable. If I’m not enjoying it, I’m out because we one thing we asked ourselves, why are we doing this? And for me, it’s about enjoying the process. But I want to live long. For me, it’s not about the money. It’s about living long.

[01:07:14] What can you do? What do you do?

[01:07:17] What else would we do? I know you play a lot more golf and improve his game.

[01:07:25] I think I think I think we’ve always got to have an exit strategy. I think whatever you do in life, you’ve got to plan ahead. So I know for both of us, we love we love property. That’s always something that we’ve been talking about for a long time. I know Jim wants to own a nightclub one day because he loves the giant party. So I’m pretty sure that’s on the cards. But who knows? Who knows? And is it the most important thing for us is it’s got to be enjoyable. Whatever the next is, it’s going to be enjoyable. Even this whole process we’re on, we’re having fun. And as Jim said, once the fun stops, then that’ll probably accelerate the exit plan.

[01:08:00] I like them, our guys will put Prav has these questions he asks at the end of each of these podcast

[01:08:10] Guys, you probably know what’s coming next, but I’m going to flip flop between the two of you. I’ve got three questions. So Jim, starting off with his self imagination last day on the planet, but you’re going to live long and have a lot of fun along the way. But let’s say that day comes and you’ve got you’ve got your little ones around you. What three pieces of wisdom would you leave them? For the rest of you, going down from a deep 60 up propertied may not ice, it’s three pieces of wisdom, I would say. Firstly, dream big as big as you want you. Whatever you want to do, you can achieve it. Secondly, enjoy your life, enjoy meaning, enjoy every process, every step of the way. Don’t put too much pressure, but don’t overdo it as well. Education is not everything that makes you do that. And lastly, I would say is the last bit advice for the kids. Difficult one, I would just say support one another, keep the family, keep keep the unit together. I think family is everything and I would say tell them, you know, support each other as you guys. You they’ll be my advice. So I dream big, happy, happy along whatever you want to do and support each other. That’s said. It’s nice and safe for you. Three pieces of wisdom.

[01:09:32] Yeah, so exactly what my grandma told me when I was growing up is that, you know, never, ever, ever chase funny because the more you chase it, the further will run away from you. I think that’s one of the most important things in life. You know, whatever you do, similar to Jim in the sense of family is always going to come first. So make sure you’re supporting each other, not only just but you kids are going to go out and not just yourselves, but the bigger family. One thing I grew up with was a great network, a support network within the family where all of us were very close. And that’s one thing I would always say to them is just try and make sure that you keep those bonds and grow them, make them stronger. And the third thing is just don’t take life too seriously. You know, it’s not all about achieving grades. It’s about being happy and living each moment to the to the max that you can you know, you don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow. So make sure you enjoy each day as much as you possibly can.

[01:10:33] It’s lovely, Jane, back to you and. If you had something written on a tombstone, say, Gene was an. Finished, finished off, what would you would your legacy be? How would you like to begin involved? Dude was jokes that Gene was joking, was jokes, it’s. And Keish.

[01:11:10] It’s a good question.

[01:11:16] Got to get straight.

[01:11:19] I was going to say that I was going to say

[01:11:23] It doesn’t have a single word of

[01:11:27] It, that let’s go with the

[01:11:29] Prav disappeared again. But his final his final final final question. And again, it’s a long way away for you guys, but let’s say you knew you had 30 days left, yet you had your health, but you knew you had 30 days left. How would you spend those 30 days?

[01:11:49] Ok, I’ll go first on that one, I mean, for me, it would be with my kids, my family, the whole lot, and I would just take them away if money wasn’t an issue. I just take them away somewhere where, you know, you could have a different experience every every day or every week. So travel around the world.

[01:12:06] Where’s your favourite place even?

[01:12:08] My favourite place was probably Bali.

[01:12:12] Beautiful, beautiful, sunny. How are you to decide I’m

[01:12:17] Going to fly straight to Vegas, but you want to join me

[01:12:23] For a business in Bogota? I’m on a

[01:12:27] Flight to Vegas. I say Pakistan unstable. That’s where we’re going, 30 nights

[01:12:34] For three nights straight

[01:12:36] Paid for by small ethnic group

[01:12:41] Respec. Could see amazing guys. It’s been lovely having you on

[01:12:47] Now, but thanks so much. I appreciate it.

[01:12:49] I appreciate it. Thanks so much, guys.

[01:12:53] This is Dental Leaders, the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging leaders, the history. Your house, Payman, Langroudi and Prav Solanki.

[01:13:09] 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 got some value out of it

[01:13:23] If you did get some value out of it. Think about subscribing and if you would share this with a friend who you think might get some value out of it, too. Thank you so, so, so much for listening. Thanks.

[01:13:34] And don’t forget our six star rating.

[00:00:00] Dentistry that I just didn’t really know existed, and we were working hard at this really nice practise in Lancashire. We thought, what, we can do this for ourselves. We don’t we don’t need to do this for someone else. It wasn’t a massive desire for us to have our own practise. It just seemed at that point that was the natural thing to do. And a lot of that was based on the fact that we wanted this around and we wanted we wanted to deliver this level of dentistry that we thought wasn’t available in the region at a time when there was big practises in Liverpool and Manchester and London for us. We looked and thought there isn’t really a landmark practise in Newcastle that was offering this really, really high level service. So from the start, our vision was, let’s just do unbelievable dentistry, let’s do dentistry, let’s have a surrounding that that looked like Harley Street.

[00:00:59] This is Dental Leaders, the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging Leaders Dental dentistry. Your heist’s Payman, Langroudi and Prav Solanki.

[00:01:16] I t gives me great pleasure today to welcome Andy Darrow to the Dental Leaders podcast to Dental to the clinical directors of the Cosmati Dental Clinic, an exclusive group of practises in Newcastle and Durham. I met you guys probably 15 years ago, and I think we both, all three of us started our journey together in business at that time. I remember driving to it must have been Liverpool. Yeah. Meeting you guys in one of your apartments and you telling me about your love, the idea of this amazing new cosmetic clinic that you wanted to launch in central Newcastle, you about superexcited. And the journey all started there, really. And I think from memory, you probably met me through my brother who you met on the Paul Tipton course, if that’s right. That’s right. They all started there. But if we take a few steps back, obviously, you guys as best friends back then, how did you how did you guys meet and get into the industry together? We were at university together and then decided to practise together. Just tell us the story of how you guys came together and then culminated in this launch of this practise. Yeah, so first of all, guys, thanks for having us on the podcast today, we’ve been listening to your podcast for the past few months. It’s been exceptional. And we do feel as though when Larry Rosen tells Hotseat today. So thanks for thanks for joining to join in today. So, yes, so is Nighty Night six Newcastle Dental School. First day I remember sort of going into where everyone signs on and looking around and sort of the case and everyone’s seen what everyone was like. And I remember seeing this lad with like a long blonde Bob with with a with a Scouse accent. And and yeah, that was the first time I met Darren.

[00:03:23] And I wish I still have that long blonde. But to be honest,

[00:03:28] He moved from Liverpool.

[00:03:30] No, no, I’m the Scouser family since, as Andy just said, thanks again, guys, for inviting us on very much. Appreciate this. But it was my apartment back in the Albert Dock of Liverpool where I first met us. But yeah, Andy and I first met Newcastle Dental School. And you know what it’s like on that first day. You look around for people like you think you’ve got similarities to people are going to have similar interests to you other than what your main reason of being there is. And I think we did very early doors.

[00:04:01] What was your first outlook when you set eyes on them on Monday? Was it was it love at first sight? Was there anything like the equivalent of the long blonde bulb that attracted you to him?

[00:04:10] I thought that there’s a lot that would look a lot better if he had the long blonde.

[00:04:15] But I also remember Darren had the eye wall one thing, but that was that was a vast array of YSL shirts in every single colour, which in nineteen ninety six, if you might remember, what were the things to have in literally every colour under the sun. And I was just, just a normal, hardworking northern lights. So, you know, I was just there to get my head down and do the study.

[00:04:44] Fashion was the thing in Liverpool still is very much a thing in Liverpool, obviously just hadn’t hit the the sunny sides of Sunderland just

[00:04:51] To know she was upset and threatened with Newcastle at the time. And so just moving on from there, did you guys become so obsessed, maybe start hanging out together from that first day? Yeah, I mean, I think Darren is both experienced of university was the same in that I think we were Newcastle University undergraduates rather than Dental school undergraduates. We spent a lot of time in the Dental school, but also the Dental school doing other stuff. I think we mixed with people from Northumbria Uni. A lot of my friends were in sports teams, rugby team, golf team, that sort of stuff. And there was a lot of people that were just completely focussed on going into the and doing dentistry where I think we were a bit more focussed on on having having an experience the university as well and exploring other avenues. And I think that’s where we became good friends, was that we actually like to do a lot of stuff that wasn’t related. And the further we went through university, we both realised that the clinical side of it was where we excelled and the clinical side of it was where we actually got the enjoyment out of it in the pharmacology books was something we all had to do. But it was when we got to the clinical Hands-On side that we both got found that that was where we got the most enjoyment and where our skill sets were as well. Did you use to talk to each other about setting up a practise together while you were students?

[00:06:19] I don’t think at that point we didn’t think it was more about enjoying life or getting through Dental school. I think there was there was that side of it that we concentrated on. I think as the years passed and we done more and more clinical work, I think we both were from a very similar mindset. Long term, I don’t think either of us ever wanted to be just driller’s and philes. You know, there was a certain type of country that we wanted to go into which our eyes were open to more and more, probably more postgrad times. But I think we just shared so many similar interests, whether it be sports, whether it be girls of Newcastle, whatever it may be, it was that side of things that probably made us connect initially.

[00:07:03] And so just give us a give us a summary of what your life at university was like in terms of we we have kids that would from last minute four exams just scrape through. And you were passing through. How was the balance? Payman? He’s got a question. He’s got his hands up. I saying, yeah, that was me.

[00:07:23] Well, I think it’s fair to say, well, I can certainly say for myself, I don’t think I’m one of life’s most academics, but what I am is somebody who’s willing to put a shift in. I’m a grafter. And so it didn’t necessarily come naturally to to me once I got to to university levels. I didn’t really struggle much through taxes and A-levels. But at university, I think trying to find that balance between uni life and study was was a challenge. And I think we certainly partied hard when we were able to party hard, but we were also the ones that would be first and at the library to get our heads down and and get through the undergrads, you know, study like we needed to.

[00:08:07] So, you know, people people say don’t go into business with friends and family. And I did. I went to business with the guys. I live with the university for five years. Yeah. I find actually you end up knowing each other really, really well. And there’s a level of trust that you have when you’ve known when you’ve grown up with someone because it doesn’t have a trust that you have. What’s your position on it? I mean, did you worry about the

[00:08:33] The bottom line is, I think what we’ve been asked that question so many times over the years, some people have said, you know, how have you managed to maintain friendships and business relationships for 15 years plus? And I think, as you say, it stems back from the start. Our relationship started out as a friendship and it’s still, to this day, very much a friendship first and business partner second. And Andy and I were still very different characters. You know, when as we grow and as we mature and life takes you in different ways from a family perspective, you’re inevitably going to change by way of character. I’m one of these people. I’m probably the stress head of the two of us. I’m the one that wants everything done to a certain standard yesterday, whereas the as has got a skill set where you can be much more laid back, you can turn things on and off as and when he wants to, which is, I must say, a skill that I’m envious of. But I think together we complement each other. And I think trust is is a massive thing for us. You know, we trust each other implicitly. People have always said with a fiver for that sort of people. But the nice thing about us is, is that we’re in a situation where when there’s decisions to be made, you know, we’re there to listen to each other with to talk to each other. And usually in a short space of time, we can come to a resolution and a solution to move things forward. And 15 years later, I wouldn’t say we’ve done too much of that

[00:09:59] In 15 years. Have you ever had any massive disagreements, post ups, sort of difference of opinion on how you should do things? And then if so, how did you come to sort of resolve? Yeah, no, we haven’t really we’ve done extremely well. I mean, when you think about it, that’s a lot of years to not have a big argument from the start. We really try to set things up to be more of an experience place. I know. I know. Now, that’s that’s a very popular thing to do to set up a dentist practise to be experienced. But that was really what what we try to do from the start. And we wanted to set it up to be somewhere that we lot we wanted to work. And we actually got enjoyment out of the day to day going in the building, using the equipment, using the technology. And we’ve been very aligned on that from the start. Our direction has always been to try and build and move things forward or to not not to do that too quickly, to take it at our own pace, to be maybe a little bit more cautious than other people have. And I know we’ve had chats in the past Prav way. You’ve said you can do this, you can do that, can do that, and we’ve done OK.

[00:11:07] But we’ll just take it at our pace. And we’ve always been quite aligned on that. It hasn’t been one of us. Let’s go and open five practises tomorrow. It’s always been let’s let’s just take a little step. Let’s be sustainable. And as well, I think going back from the university days, we have a friendship that is not Dental, first of all. So, I mean, a lot of the time we spent together at university was not sitting and studying. It was going to watch the match, are going to be a sports day or something like that. And I think having that background still is still relevant, that if we just talked about teeth all of the time, we’d probably have a lot of arguments it and being able to just sort of at least say, OK, do you want to watch the Liverpool match this week? I’m just not worth watching. So so we tend to watch Liverpool. That’s that’s. I’ve been a big thing. Indulge me, tell me about that first day you met Prav. How did you come across? Because I think we met I met Prav similar time to when you guys met him.

[00:12:15] Well well, I can take you back to it because it feels like yesterday, to be fair, despite having all of you years ago with obviously Andy and I had this idea. We knew what we wanted to do. We knew what we we felt. We knew what we needed to do to achieve it. But one big thing we found is that look at all of the practises that we’re in and around the Northeast, because at this point, we’ve decided the Northeast was where we wanted to go. So we tried to do our research and see what was out there. And there seems to be quite a lack of websites. So we basically needed someone on board who could enlighten us as to what we needed to do. So Andy was doing the Tipton course over the Caliche at the time. So Andy Cohen said to me, well, if I’ve heard from Kay that this is somebody that we can work with at that point, we knew it was Kay’s brother. And then before us, we arranged a meeting at my house. It was my first home in the Albert Dock in Liverpool. And Prav turned up in a Ford car, I think is his car choices somewhat changed in recent times. And yeah, I was proud of her. And we we all sat down together and and worked out what we needed to do.

[00:13:28] So it was it was at that point we’re talking 15 years ago, it was like to have a website. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it was really quite strange how it all came about, as David was saying that I was speaking to coalition with and I think he would just sell Chris Dental at this point. And I was saying we’ve got these big ideas of this big fancy practise in Newcastle, but we need to be digital. We need to we need to get something on the on the way. And I said, well, I’ve been using a really good guy is he’s really experienced, knows what he’s talking about. He says, no, maybe you should hit him up. And the funny thing was that when we opened our practise, first of all, we did well. When we when we launched the business, we had a website that provided a great deal of design and we had a wreck of a building in Newcastle that you couldn’t even walk in because the rain came all through all five stories of the building. And we literally did interviews for members of staff in the Malmaison Hotel in the Cup and the key side of Newcastle. So actually, the first thing we actually had was was this website from Prav. And that was going to generate as thousands of patients and get the business kick started, including the one you’re in now.

[00:14:44] It’s the same building. Yeah, this building came up at this point. We made our decision, not Newcastle was the place to be for us. And we searched and searched around the area and then stumbled across this building, an old Heldon square, which we fell in love with immediately. It was at the time it was on the buildings at risk, rich buildings at risk register. So we were hoping that there might be some sort of grants available for this grade to list listed building that might help these two young whippersnappers to, you know, to develop a practise within it. Funnily enough, the minute we paid the deposit for the building, it disappears off the building, got rich register. And so it was almost to to pull it round. And to be fair, there was times during that first 12, 18 months where we were worried that we’d pay off more than we could chew. There was five stories of this building that was in quite a poor state of repair. And the other interesting story was that on the morning that we just paid the deposit for the building, that was the first time we met English Heritage. It was to have a meeting on site. And the first thing the guy said to us was, do not buy this building to this day, which we never really knew why they were advising us against this. But they say in life that you need a little bit of luck to go along with hard work. And two or three days after this meeting, we opened up the centre pages of the the local rag, the Newcastle Chronicle, and there was a plan set out to redevelop Old, Old and Square. So that reinstated for us that it was the right place to be. And it’s a beautiful old Georgian terrace, as I say, five stories tall. And it was a labour of love, you know, to get this building restored back to its former glory. And now is a place where we really do enjoy going to work on a daily basis and

[00:16:42] Just take us through the process of having that lofty vision at this superduper practise. And obviously mindful that you didn’t rent this building, you actually went all in and bought it. Right. It’s great to list the five story buildings, your first wall and you’ve bought. Ebola free hold, right, just take us through the whole process of what it was like having the idea. All the way to probably one of the most successful cosmetic properties in the Northeast. So the idea at the start was, first of all, we’re both working in Lancashire to really good practise down there, which was Mike Booth’s practise and Phil Broughton with that, two amazing clinicians. We’d seen a lot of unbelievable work. It was very technology driven. It was driven at this time. We just got into the ICD as well. And I think I got back from my first conference in Vancouver and was literally just blown away by what is possible in dentistry. I saw dentistry there that I just didn’t really know existed. And we were working hard at this really nice practise in Lancashire. And we thought, what, we can do this for ourselves. We don’t we don’t need to do this for someone else. It wasn’t a massive desire for us to have our own practise. It just seemed at that point that was the natural thing to do.

[00:18:05] And a lot of that was based on the fact that we wanted this around and we wanted we wanted to deliver this level of dentistry that was that we thought wasn’t available in the region at a time. There was big practises in Liverpool and Manchester and London for us. We looked and thought there isn’t there isn’t really a landmark practise in Newcastle that was offering this really, really high level service. So from the start, our vision was, let’s just do unbelievable dentistry, let’s do dentistry, let’s have a surrounding that that looked like Harley Street. And I think that was that was when we fell in love with the practise, was that the building itself looks like a Harley Street practise the floor to ceiling windows, the 18 30s architecture. It looks like Harley Street. And that was our vision from the start. And we just couldn’t say no to this building. It was too much for us. We couldn’t run and we had to buy it. And we just looked at it and thought, well, what’s the worst thing that could happen if we lose our deposits and we go and get a job somewhere else? And our mind set for the first three or four years was what’s the worst thing that could happen? So we were young, we didn’t have dependents.

[00:19:21] And we thought, well, if we’re not going to do it now, when we’re going to do it, we might as well go all in at this time. Just focus on the dream, focus on our how we want it to be focussed on the street. And I think our mindset was if if we do the dentistry that we want to do, people will come and people will see it will we knew quite a lot of people in Newcastle already, so we knew we could lean on a few people and just say, OK, let’s get you in, let’s wait in your teeth and go and tell everyone about it. And it was very much word of mouth at that time, and that’s how it snowballed. And we went from to start off with I worked two days a week. There were two days a week. We had one receptionist and one nurse to remove the full time. We got a couple of more members of staff. We then did another floor of the building. We got some more dentists in and we just build a bit by bit. And now we’ve got nine surgeries over the two sites. We’ve got, what, eight clinicians is it now?

[00:20:23] We’ve got six associates, three therapists and hygienists now.

[00:20:27] Yeah, yeah, yeah. You see the difference there that Darren was just like we’ve got six associates, three therapists, blah, blah, blah. And you were talking earlier about how one of you is just so laid back and the other one is just the detail. And you just saw that this is

[00:20:50] What you know. Within that, though, Prav is why this is work for us over the years. Absolutely. We are very different characters from very different backgrounds, but we both bring something to the table. And I think, as I say, the nice thing is, is that we complement each other to push things forward. And I think that the bottom line is, I’m sure this times throughout this journey where I have drove on the absolutely mat and similarly and vice versa, it’s coming the other way. But the beauty is that together, irrespective of where we’ve come from, we both seem to have the same business and Dental goals we’re aligned with.

[00:21:26] Top of that, I think, as well, was we knew that each other had clinical skills, that we weren’t going to be let down by the other member of the team. So through Dental school, we knew that our work was at the top end of our group. And when we got into private practise, we knew that we could deliver really good quality dentistry. And I think being able to to trust the the person’s clinical ability has always been good. I mean, even as the practises grow, the type and the quality of dentistry that we’ve been able to do is is always been comparable. And it wasn’t that I could do something and Darren couldn’t or vice versa. We’ve always been able to to rely on each other’s dentistry, which has been a massive help.

[00:22:06] Absolutely. And people very. To talk about and I’ve listened to it on the podcast where people talk about mentors and as daft as it might sound, I feel, yes, we’ve both done so much postgrad work. We’ve gone on different courses. We’ve gone all around the world doing research. But we’ve probably mentor each other because we’ve done it together from from the get go. We’ve always turn to each other to share knowledge and make each other a better clinician.

[00:22:34] Just go back to Mike Booth. I remember hearing stories about Mike back in the day that as a clinician, he was absolutely phenomenal at speaking to patients and just had this natural ability to be able to, we say in the most ethical sense, cell treatment of cells, big cases. So Broughton’s always had a great reputation as well. What did you learn from those guys back in the days when you were at the clinic in Lancashire? I mean, it was it was a fantastic opportunity to go work at that practise. At the time, I was working at an oasis practise up in the north east and a position came available at that practise. And I had no desire to go and live in Lancashire. And I went to work at that place 100 percent for the dentists who were there and for the technology they had. And I took over a lot of Mike’s list. So I was able to see all of his work, sewage treatment plants and really picked up so much knowledge on the way from that. I mean, he did a lot of really big, complex cases, did a lot of big bridgework, lot of big small crown veny work.

[00:23:38] And and the standard was really, really high. And it was probably the first time that I realised how much sort of volume was possible in dentistry as well, because he he worked at a very quick pace and he got work done. If someone needed a full mouth rehab, you could turn it round in and next to no time and sang with fellows. Well, while some of the some of the composite work that Phil used to do was amazing and I was blown away, I’ve never seen that sort of quality of composite work before. And just actually being able to recall these patients and see it first hand was was like the best quality mentorship that anyone could possibly have at that time. Because, you know, when I’ve come to your practise, one thing that I’ve noticed is that the team seem really happy. Is that process of managing a team and and creating culture in the practise, you find that easy or is that something you’re constantly having to work at?

[00:24:39] I think well, when we first started out, it was funnily enough, we bumped into a guy who was in our year group is named Paul Thapar, and he owns a number of practises at quite a young age up in the Northeast. And we bumped into him in a car garage of all places, and we realised we were coming to the northeast and he said to us there. And then the biggest problem you will have during your career is practise practitioners is stuff. And we were sitting there at this point feeling really quite chill with ourselves because it was just me and the nurses and the receptionists and life was going just fine, OK, but we knew that as we needed to scale up, we had to build a reactor. We had to build that ethos to the people that were coming to join us. And I think early on we Andy and I did everything ourselves from the business management side of things, the recruitment side of things, the business management side of things, as well as being the dentists. And it was all baby. And we didn’t want to really hand over and delegate to others in case they weren’t taking things in the same direction as what we were.

[00:25:47] But once we got to a certain size, we realised that it really just wasn’t possible. And so we really did invest a lot of time and effort in finding the right people to then bring things forward with us. And I think the key to that in more recent times has been finding the right practise manager. And we have a practise manager, Lisa, who works with us now, who we, again, trust implicitly with our baby. And she helps now with recruitment side of things, business management, side of things, while we can focus on dentistry and grow in the brand. But I think, yeah, you’re right, it’s it’s not something that comes naturally to you. Nobody teaches you this Dental school. And it’s something I think, between the pair of us learns along the way. And yes, there’s been mistakes along the way in terms of recruitment. But I think that’s the only way you can very often learn. But the team that we have there now from clinicians all the way through to admin teams, you know, is a team that we’re extremely proud of and we’re keen to push forward with.

[00:26:47] Just talking about mistakes along the way, either hiring the wrong person or maybe getting rid of the wrong person or for the wrong reasons. Can you just enlighten us to a couple of experiences along the way, maybe having to get rid of someone who did the firing, was it or was earning? And where we did we did have a big sort of blip a few years ago that we more recently, our practise fund manager is just absolutely amazing. Dental, Prav. That’s really what we managed before the manager, before it turned out that she’d been up in the hands in the till a little bit. And when it came to light, it was quite a few quit and it got very serious very quickly. And that was our biggest mistake on the way. And looking back, it was horrendous and it really escalated and it turned out to be something that went a long way. But as an experience for us, we learnt so much about what we should do and what we need to keep our eyes on and and and things that can happen. We’ve always been so trusting. We trust everyone. And I think that was a big turning point where where we realised that, yes, we can trust people. And yes, we should always give people the benefit of the doubt, but not to not to to a point where we’ve taken our eye off the ball a little bit.

[00:28:14] So, I mean, that was probably the biggest bump in the road that we’ve had over the over the fifteen years. And I still look at that and think there was there was a lot of positive that came from that. It didn’t obviously turn out well for her. And, you know, we didn’t do so well financially that year. But I think that has actually pushed us on to the next level and we wouldn’t be where we are today if we hadn’t actually had that experience. So what was the process of obviously discovering? Not the initial shock of it all. And then I’m assuming you guys chat it through with each other. How are you going to approach her? Who was going to have the conversation with what you were going to say? Maybe repeat the conversation in your own head a hundred times, and then what would you talk about the hiring and firing process? It’s always one that induces quite a bit of anxiety, and especially with something like this where, you know, it’s been motivated by by by theft, I guess. How did you just approach that problem?

[00:29:15] I think we approach that one like we approach most things. We did it together. And it was one of these where we’ve, you know, with the type of people that like to face things from the on. And so it was one of these ones being brought to our attention, really, as to what might be happening. It was just straight into our office, sat down across the table from her and tried to establish what on earth was going on. And, you know, the. Particular person was very much in denial. But the facts were there, you know, this was this was taken on by by the police in the end. And this patient’s story, this person got a custodial sentence as a result of all of this. But, yeah, like everything else, we take these things head on together and we work our way through these things, thankfully, hired and fired as a as a general rule within the practise that the firing squad has been very limited. We’ve got a lot of team members that have been with us there for a very long time. So that side of things is not something that we’ve had to do on a on a routine basis. The hiring side of things is, again, something that we very much get involved with, particularly nowadays. It’s probably more for the clinician side of things. And we have Lisa and the management teams underneath her that do the rest of the staff. But we’re very much heavily involved in choosing the right dentists and therapists and hygienists to come and join us, because, again, in protection of our baby, we want to be involved at that point to ensure that the people will bring an end to upset the apple cart that we’ve worked so hard to achieve and to make sure that they’re going to follow the same ethos that we want our practises to work.

[00:30:51] What qualities does a clinician need to earn a place at your clinic? I mean, it’s evolved quite a bit over the over the past few years. At the start, when we were at capacity, we were looking and thinking, how are we going to get someone else in? What level do they need to be on? Do they need to be the finished article to the need to be just full of passion, to the need to be full of energy. And we have a really, really good senior associate that works with us, who’s been with us for quite a few years now called Neil Hare. And and he came in and done some private dentistry award stuff. He came in with a big portfolio of work, which back then people just didn’t have. And we always just looked for passion and a bit of a work ethos. I think that was that there were the two main things that we’ve always tried to look look for. And from that, that’s probably the last time we’ve advertised for a job. But the practise since then, we got a lot of CVS and I think we’ve been extremely lucky to actually being able to attract a lot of the Dental talent of the north east. We’ve got some amazing guys there at the minute, as you know, and is very much a team effort. And every single clinician has been picked on. Yes. That can do a great clinical job or to have the right work ethic. Are they brought in with our cosmetic Dental clinic ethos of of quality precision care? I mean, those are the three core values that we’ve had from the start, and that’s really how it’s evolved over the years.

[00:32:25] Our last few associates have literally just budgeters for so long with CVS and cases of the case of isn’t the case. Obviously now it gets a bit more digital and it’s a bit more getting tagged in Instagram posts and things like that. But I mean, that that just shows to us how passionate these people are. And that’s that’s what we that’s what we really have tried to grow in the practise. We’ve always preferred to bring on younger dentists that just have that fire in them rather than someone that’s been doing it for years and years and years. And they just look at it picking up the paycheque. And yeah, I can churn out so many whatevers and I can earn some money. We’ve we’ve always wanted it to be a career progression from people. Let’s start we’ve done a couple of mentorship staff contracts with dentists as well, where we’ve had them under our wing for a year and we’ve talked them through Invisalign and could ontology and some of our practises, Thorstein, and now they’re just flying at practise. And it’s been such a great part of the process to be able to see these guys grow from where they started coming to as an age for twenty or thirty two to to actually where they are now. These were the nicest things about a business is seeing people grow, isn’t it? There’s so many other problems and issues with that.

[00:33:45] That one thing for me is one, the nicest thing about owning because you’ve been a long term and you can see long term, what happens is how do you divide the work between you? I mean, who takes care of one? Because one of you will naturally go one way and one with another who handles Prav, for instance? That’s always a three summate. Who handles Prav? Yeah, work is definitely a double double heads when we’re dealing with there’s too many ideas for minutes. We have to write it all down. What not naturally the clinical work divides itself. OK, solved and the flow of patients into practise naturally gets divided up. And we’ve always, as we’ve gone along, as the jobs come in, we might have ten jobs on the table. We’ll just say that’s five for you, that’s five for me. And Robyn is trying to use. All of our energy to the both of us have to do these 10 jobs, we’ve always just tried to split it. So I trust you to get those jobs done. I’ll do those jobs and then we’ll just report back. So I think actually having the partnership along the way has really been able to help us to grow and to get to be to be a lot more productive. And we try not to cross over too much and allow the other person to get that job done so that we can do something else a bit more productive with our time as well.

[00:35:06] And I think it’s fair to say when we are splitting up these jobs and we are delegating to one another, that’s something that you learn through time. You learn who’s better at what role, you know. And so I think it sort of happens quite quickly, quite naturally, when the jobs but will always still turn to each other ultimately for the final decisions, because this has been a joint effort from the start and it will continue to be.

[00:35:30] Just just in terms of making sort of big decisions, like, for example, you recently opened the Invisalign Centre within your practise, so, for example, buy in the new clinic in Durham. It was not like an idea that came together. Or did one of you have the idea each other? How did these conversations come about?

[00:35:52] Well, the Invisalign Centre one or Invisalign, so to correctly phrase, this was brought about, quite interestingly, really going back many years ago. And then I had an idea for the third floor of the cosmetic Dental clinic. And at that point we were I’m going back to probably two thousand eight, two thousand nine. And we invited one of the top guys, the head guys from Invisalign up for a meal. And we said to him, look, you’ve got a number of practises offering this service. You’ve got your people on the ground who were going out to visit these practises, but they’re only delivering a few numbers of cases. Why don’t you allow us to be a regional centre of excellence, in essence for Invisalign and allow us to be the Invisalign centre again, despite our wining and dining? It was a no no, but we tried. And then rather ironically, some years later, Andy and I had been recruited by Dan Splicer Sorona to teach dentistry over and across the GCC or from there were from Bahrain, Abu Dhabi, Dubai, how to use Sirico Software. And while we were out in Dubai, we found and trust to come across a site which was in essence an Invisalign centre.

[00:37:07] So we were like, surely this can still be done all these years later. So that was something that I think we always felt we wanted to try and implement into our clinics. And then by weird twist of fate, it wasn’t long later that I approached by an Invisalign representative, coincidentally from Dubai, who pitched this idea about an Invisalign dedicated area within the practise and by which stage we’ve been delivering Invisalign for 15 years, plus something that we had a big passion for. And so we said, if anybody is going to do this, we want to be the first to do it. And so that decision come very easily to us and everything just sort of aligned to make sure that that sort of happened and it was the right thing for us to do. And I think the room was very it was no different to that. We’ve always just had these ideas together, which we we bounce off each other when we’re in nonclinical times, and then we’ll usually run things by the likes of yourself. Prav you think it’s a good idea?

[00:38:05] I remember that you said, will you come down to the practise? We’ve got someone to tell you. I was like, what is this? And you just told me you’ve got this new clinic in Durham and there’s a massive opportunity there, blah, blah, blah. And it was a bit like, you wait, you watch Prav got to say, what, what, what are we going to do about it? And it seemed like the natural progression for you guys to just sort of get practise number two. But I would like to know, because I’ve had this conversation with numerous people who’ve got multiple practises, what additional challenges of is to present compared to what you were expecting. So a lot of people think, oh, well, practise one is doing well, I’ll just buy practise to multiply it by two and it cannot be all right. How did you deal with that whole process of first of all, if you divide the time, one of you being in Durham all the time, one of you being in Newcastle, getting the new team up to scratch, et cetera, et cetera, how did you handle that transition from one to two? What obstacles came in the way? Well, I think it was probably quite different how other people approach it, because I think other people would would have gone and bought an existing practise with existing patients and they would have just either decided to rebrand or not rebrand and just really take over with all of its issues and with all of its positives where we just looked at it as winding the clock back to what we did in Newcastle.

[00:39:28] Rather than doing that, we were just going to find some space and we were going to just start from scratch again. And we were at full capacity at Newcastle, but we had quite a lot of patients that would come up from the Durham area. And again, going back to twenty six. When we looked at Newcastle, we looked around the city and we felt as though there wasn’t much, there wasn’t many practises that were trying to deliver really high quality cosmetic Invisalign implant dentistry down there so we could have opened up next door to the Newcastle practise. But we thought maybe it’s time to branch out. But we approached it very much that. Right. We’re going to this is going to be a squat again. We’re going to do the same process. We’re going to learn from the process that happened over five or six years in Newcastle. And we just try to accelerate that. And with your help, that’s sort of what we did. We obviously knew that a lot of our our reputation was there already and a lot of our traffic came through.

[00:40:27] The fantastic website that you put together for. Over the years, and we were fairly confident we were going to get people through the door because we could push people around, so initially we did it in a very same way as Newcastle, that I went down a couple a day and a half a week down, went down a day and a half a week. We then built I hope we got some extra associate days in the book down there. And gradually we’ve sort of crept back from it a little bit. But I’m still down there. One full clinical data we can dance down there, one full clinical day a week. And we’ve got two soon to be three associates down there the rest of the week with therapists cover as well. So we really use the resources we already had and we just stretched out a little bit. And that that worked so much better than buying another practise for as I think and I think it just fit in our model better to do it that way rather than to look at trying to change someone else’s practise. And we were in control of all the variables by doing it that way. So moving on from there, guys, what’s the plan? Practise three, four, five. Be happy and safe. What’s the what’s the big goal?

[00:41:38] This is a question that the accountants keep asking us. You know, thankfully, things are all moving in the right direction. Even despite the year that we’ve all had. We used covid could have been such a dark and bad time as as it was for so many and is for so many. But on reflection, if every cloud has a silver lining, covid was an opportunity for us to take a step back from the usual day to day. And we use that opportunity to look in at the business from the outside and realised where we could make changes to move things further forward. So we’ve come back from the Kova Times and yes, OK, we’re still working on all of these restrictions. But, you know, the team is on board. We’re pushing on we’re moving things in the right direction. Financially, things are bouncing back. And so it comes to saying to us, right, guys, when’s the next one open and where are you going to go next? Well, we’re realising now that, you know, down this line, we’re not getting any younger. There’s now dependence that we have to think about this. There’s more of a necessity to try and strike a work life balance, which certainly from my own perspective, I’ll say I’ve failed miserably for all of these years.

[00:42:50] But now with young ones in tow, it’s something I’m certainly conscious of that we need to we need to improve upon because we’re not going to get these years back with the little ones. So the thought of opening of a practise on paper looks like the right thing to do. What have we got? The energy at this time to do is have we got the time to do it at this point in time? Probably not at this point, but that’s not to say that can’t happen again in the future. But at this point, as Andy alluded to earlier, we’ve always done things incrementally, slowly but surely, because we’ve literally we’ve got ourselves to fall back on, too. So we didn’t want to go making any too big leaps of faith. And I think we’re comfortable where we’re at at the moment. Nine surgeries across two sites keeps us busy enough. And I think for the time being, that’s where it’s going to be asked. But who knows? What’s this

[00:43:42] Space? We’ve definitely got some more projects to this. And I think in our project is to is to just push through on that little bit further. And we’ve always looked at it from the very start of what’s the worst thing that can happen if you’re hoping something for all of a sudden that that dynamic looks a little bit more scary, there will be more that will do that might be practise three. It might be practise five, it might be practise ten. It might be something different, but it’s not on the horizon at the minute. We’ve always wanted just to have the growth first before we we sort of overexpose ourselves and we’ve never wanted to try and stretch ourselves to the limit that we lose focus on the day quality dentistry that we do. And I suppose one of our our major issues over the past few years is just we love to actually be in surgery. And it would be a lot easier for us if one of us said, look, I’m not going to do anything anymore. I’m just going to do business development. I’m just going to do staff training. But we both actually really like that part of the job. And we’ve got a real kick out of that side of the job. And that’s probably been at the detriment of of how many practises we’ve we’ve got. If we didn’t love it so much, we probably have ten practises by now. How do you guys cope with the work life balance? So as you start it off, as young single men who launched this practise and I guess puts everything into it, looks flat and says you could work eight hour days if you wanted and nothing mattered, and then family and kids came alone. How did that how did that change things?

[00:45:17] Well, I think there was one big advantage of of growing a team and growing trust within a team is that you can then ultimately start to delegate things off. We’re not these type of principles where we demand that we see all of the new patients coming through the doors, as Andy said earlier, which we distribute those out, but we are in a situation now where we know we need to generate time and we’re surrounded by very capable pair of hands as of hands that we can delegate certain elements of the work to. So that is something that we’re definitely working on. And I think, you know, trying to free up time to ensure that the businesses continue to move forward while still maintaining the same standards of dentistry whilst then balancing a home life is something that is going to need constant work. But again, I think we’re getting better and better. That is times going on and it’s something that we’ll continue to work with.

[00:46:17] Just talk us through both of you. How does that play out in your own personal lives? So it’s different than the typical week. What sort of hours you work and where most of the time you get for the family, what time you get into bed for you in the morning and on your way to work? How does that come out for a busy couple of practises like yourselves with the workload split between you? So I we both work three and a half days. Wednesdays are our days for admin and we’ve got a little bit of flexibility in the week to to pull in big cases if we want. I’ve got an eight and a 10 year old and I try and do four or five trouble can pick up pick ups a week. I’ve tried to be present and that’s that’s the hardest bit. You speak to anyone that’s got a business and a family, that’s the hardest part, trying to schedule it. And then the week also over the last few years, it’s been trying to pencil some time into exercise and looking after ourselves as well. And we’re not getting any younger. We need to look after the engine. There’s no point flogging ourselves to to death and not having any health left at the end of it. And it’s definitely something that we’ve tried to work on weekends is watching my son play football, picking up the golf sticks, some golf balls, just trying to relax, trying to keep it simple. My favourite part of the week is still coming back on a Friday, Friday afternoon, switching off, seeing what the kids have been up to and just relaxing for the weekend. It evolved so much over the last 15 years and it’s still going to be something we need to work on trying to get that balance.

[00:48:01] And I think it’s fair to say that’s something you’re much better off than I am. You know, I yeah, I’m a I’m a workaholic. And I think it stems back from the work ethic that certainly my father instilled into me. I feel that and I’m guilty of feeling guilty if I’m not sitting at a laptop when I’m nonclinical on, this is going to be to my detriment. So let’s make changes to this. I certainly don’t make enough time for exercise in these sorts of things. The things that I know I’ve got to push forward on. I feel as well with some of the changes that we introduced as a result of covid. There’s so many more things now which are cloud based that we do. On your advice, Prav, we changed our in-house software systems. So now I feel that, yes, I might be reduced to my clinical hours, but there’s not that many more things I can do working on and in the business from home, which you can get sucked into so easily. And I feel particularly at this time, because there’s not a lot that we can do outside of work because of the current restrictions that the world is under. I’m finding myself opening up that laptop far too much on Saturdays and Sundays when really I should be spending that time with family. And I’m hoping as the the world is unlocked with all of the with Boris’s plans, I’m hoping that will instigate further change for me to try and separate work and home life for some time conscious. I’ve certainly got to work on it to punish yourself then. I mean,

[00:49:31] If that’s your natural position, if you if you thrive in that situation, then you should lean into that. I think it’s like it’s like me trying to get myself a diary and organise my week, find me the most expensive diary in the world. I still not going to use it. And your kids, from what you’re saying about spending time with your kids, when your kid sees that you’re working hard and you’re obsessed by your work, that will be a lesson you learnt, just like you learn from your dad is.

[00:50:03] No, absolutely. Absolutely. And I think that’s the most valuable lesson I have ever learnt from my parents, is that hard work and determination is what is what gets you where you need to be. And I’m very grateful for that lesson was taught to me and I’m, you know, hell bent on ensuring that my daughter picks up on those traits as well. But at the same time, I’ve also got to realise that I’ve got a wife who also. Works extremely hard, and I’ve certainly got to keep her sweet because she’s a divorce lawyer, so I’ve yeah, I’ve got to realise that it’s not just about me. And I feel as a business owner, as a dentist, you can become quite a selfish individual in an effort to strive and achieve as much as you possibly can. You know, I know you’ve asked people in the past about dark days in business. And my wife would definitely say that her darkest days of being with me was when I took on a Masters because I would literally not long been engaged. And then there was a wedding and a house move to organise while I was taking myself off to the office. Every given opportunity. And I do have to consider these people. And, you know, we do have to realise that there’s more important things necessarily than than teeth and businesses. While you’re right, you do have something inbuilt within you. You do have to embrace that. You do have to consider those around you to expand.

[00:51:29] Well, if you weren’t a dentist.

[00:51:32] What would we be if we weren’t dentists?

[00:51:35] I would I would I would have loved to be in sport, and so my grown up, I would have loved to be a pro golfer wasn’t good enough, but it was always it was always hands on things for me. I would make cupboard’s I would be enjoying the outdoors. I would be a carpenter. I would always be making something with my hands. I would absolutely hate to sit in an office 9:00 to 5:00. It would drive me absolutely crazy. And we’re getting quite a lot of work and a house in a minute. I’m quite happy gardening for a full week and I’m quite happy. Make something, make a flower beds. I don’t know that that’s the sort of thing that I would as long as it’s outside active and making something, I’d be happy.

[00:52:18] And I think that’s probably why we both excelled really at the more the Dental surgery sides rather than the academia side of it. When we were at Dental school and people very often asked me that question of why, why did you become a dentist? Because again, I just growing up wanted to be my dad and my dad is a car mechanic and all. I wanted to be with him and I’d done everything in my power to boogum and pester him going into his garage, passing them the tools. And he was hell bent on me not becoming a car mechanic. He always said to me, Son, I appreciate you want to work with your hands, but you’ve got a better head on your shoulders than I have. Can you please fix something else? And it was as simple as this. He took me to a Dental appointments. Mr. Philippos was the dentist and in Krosby in Liverpool. And I was sitting there whilst my sister was getting her examination and he said to me, come on. So what is it that you’re going to do? I’m not allowing you to get underneath cars like I have. It’s far too hard to trace. Can you not fix something else? And at that point, he said, can you not fix teeth? And no word of a lie, I’ve never changed my mind since I thought that was something that I could go about doing. I did a picture of Mr. Philippos on his mantelpiece in his surgery of him and his family on a boat. And my dad tried to convince me that that was his boat. To this day, I do not know whether that was his boat or not, but I figured I could fix something and that would enable me to make money to do things in life that we might not have been able to do earlier on.

[00:53:56] We ask a question about clinical errors so that we can all learn from them from that sort of black box thinking in. What would you some of what some of your clinical errors made over the years and what can we all learn from the. I honestly don’t feel as though I’ve made any massive clangers, thankfully. I know some people talk about the wrong tooth and that sort of that sort of thing, although I Dental possible as an undergraduate, I did try and take a take. I think it was a long way out and I managed to bring out the adult tooth underneath it, which are probably straight back and quite quickly. But yeah, I don’t I don’t think clinically because we’ve always tried to work within our limits and I think I get a bit frustrated nowadays when I see dentistry and not work within the limits and try and do stuff that they shouldn’t be doing. And they’ve seen it once on YouTube and try and try and give it a crack and would never try and do that. We’ve always tried to get the knowledge, take little steps, work within ourselves and always be cautious. And that’s something that we really try and get over to our younger associates that we need to work within our limits and we shouldn’t be doing stuff that that is outside of our box and outside of our comfort zone. And I think that takes you a long way. I can’t really think we’ve always had cases that don’t quite go to plan and bridges that the porcelain chips, but nothing that’s really disastrous and nothing that we didn’t plan for failure before the start. I can’t remember any big climb.

[00:55:35] Yeah, I’d say likewise from my side of things. But there are two cases which I do often reflect back on. And not long after a qualified I was lucky enough to go and work in a VTE position in a in a lovely Big Ten Sadri practise in southpaws and my VTE training, which was great to me. And he really let me just get stuck in and I feel a lot of the new graduates these days probably don’t have that level of autonomy to be able to make those mistakes early on and learn from them. But I always remember, you know, fresh out with the books and the textbooks. So it’s, you know, studied about the Dahl effect. And I remember this guy comes in to see me quite an advanced work case. And I thought to myself, right, I’m getting stuck in on this one. The VTE trainer allowed me to go gung ho and I took the decision to have fabricated a Kobol Chrom Dalle appliance, which I like bonded to the ills of the upper arch with Pineview. Now, thankfully,

[00:56:39] This job,

[00:56:40] It served its purpose, but that was two hours of my life that I will never get back drilling a Cobalt Grumdahl appliance off the rails. So that was a that was an eye opener to be very early on. I think the second one that always jumps to mind is I there was a very elegant lady come into this surgery and Southport and she needed a bridge remove. And now, thankfully, this bridge was lower right quadrant. And I was introduced to the first time to a crown and bridge remover. So I took to this bridge with it and unfortunately managed to decolonise one of those lower abutments. And in the 20 years since, I have never gone near a crown and bridge removed.

[00:57:25] Is it one of those spring-Loaded ones or was it one of those wait wait things?

[00:57:30] It was the weight is the weight, and it still sends shivers through my spine. Now that I would like to try to remove a bridge with one of those. So everything’s been sectioned since I was a less well earlier.

[00:57:41] You guys have been in that practise for fifteen years. You must have seen some of your work that you’re not one hundred percent sure that you would repeat that work. Now, you know, things have moved on,

[00:57:53] That sort of thing. Yeah, absolutely. I think, you know, certainly, yes. The year we know that Dental trends have changed, you know, early on there was probably a lot more ceramic work done. There was probably a lot more longer span bridges done with more training that’s been done. We’ve probably look at things in a different light. There’d be a lot more implants placed into those scenarios. Now, we might use adult orthodontics much more so now than what we would have done back in two thousand, seven, two thousand and eight. But one thing that is nice to see, though, as you look back at old ceramic cases and when they’ve been done properly, they do well and they tend to give you a lot less headaches than a chip and composite can might do these days. You know, but, you know, was it the right thing to do then? Is it the right thing to do now? Well, opinions will differ, OK, but I think we’ve always wanted to learn. We’ve always wanted to move forward with the trends and with the Times, but also tried to make sure that what we were doing is clinically the right thing to do for that patient.

[00:58:59] So I know you listen to this podcast. So the final questions. And I’ll start with you. But it’s your last day on the planet. You’ve got two kids with you and you need to leave them with three pieces of advice. Will they be? First of all, I think I think honesty is is something that has always been really important to me, and it’s one thing that frustrates me when I don’t see honesty. I think if you try to never tell a lie, you never have to try and explain yourself, because you never have to try and remember the truths and the lies that you’ve told. I think you should always be honest with people. Sometimes you have to hold your hand up and say, I got it wrong. But it was coming from a place of honesty and it was it came from the right place. I would always want my kids to be, to be honest. The second thing would be hard work. And, you know, this is a phrase that hard work pays off and you can outwork most people. Some people are always going to be cleverer than you. But you can can you can you outwork this person in a lot of the challenges in life is just how many hours are you willing to do? How many can you repeat the same thing? Ten thousand times to say if you if you repeat something ten thousand times, you become a master of it.

[01:00:29] That’s a bit of a philosophy with dentistry. But that’s that can be transferred over to kick in free kicks or a driver or whatever you want to be. So the second one would be would be definitely be hard work. And I suppose the last one would be the ethos that we’ve talked about a bit today is is what’s the worst thing that can happen? Go for it if you think, well, the worst thing that can happen is that I can go back to what I was doing before. Well, that’s not a bad place. I’d like to think I was going to have my kids back. So if they tried a big elaborate scheme and it fell flat on the on the face, I’m always gonna have a spare room for them. So don’t be frightened to fail. Give it a crack going back to two thousand and six. That was our philosophy of if this bomb’s within a month, we’ll just go back and get a job somewhere. So those are probably the three things I would say.

[01:01:24] And I think it’s fair to say again, my sentiments would mirror exactly this. But what I want to pass on to my family and young ones, you know, and I think the only things I would probably say in addition to that is yet we know sheer hard work and determination is something that will get you everywhere, you know, and always just do your best on that front. And I would definitely want my kids as well to do what I’ve done, surround themselves by like minded people, surround yourself by people like you can learn from. And that will only help you grow as an individual and push things forward. But I think the other thing I would desperately want to pass on to my little girl is I’m guilty of one thing. And my mom told me this since day one, and it comes definitely from my father, is that I’m guilty of not being able to see the wood for the trees. And that’s what she’s told me for a long, long time. And I think I’m always one of these people who strive in for the next thing and wanting something to be bigger and better than what it was. Whereas I think you really do need to be able to step back and enjoy the here and now. And that’s something I definitely want my daughter to be competitive. I wanted to have drive, but I also wanted to enjoy every step of the journey and appreciate what she’s achieved along the way. And I think that’s something I would I would definitely like to change in her from what I have learnt locally.

[01:02:46] And that even if it was your last day on the planet and you passed and then somebody spoke about you, what would you want your legacy to be? Darren was complete the sentence.

[01:03:00] I would say as a dentist, I want Darren to be regarded as the clinician who doing everything he possibly could for every patient and not just to deliver the best possible experience and the best possible treatments. As a friend, I would like to be regarded as the person who my friends could turn to. And as a father and a husband, I would like to be the person that they needed the most and done what he could when he could to provide and deliver and to be the lovely.

[01:03:34] And what about you? And they how would you like to be remembered? I think first and foremost, as a someone that wasn’t too serious or could get it done, that was relaxed or can lose it ends, you know, someone to try to enjoy that the time on the way as well, someone that didn’t get too caught up with the little nitty gritty and just try to take a bit of a bit of a step back. But someone that you can always rely on, I suppose someone that if it was ever needed, I would step up, I would do what’s required. I wouldn’t be frightened to get stuck in and go that extra mile if it was really needed. And let’s say tomorrow, somebody said to Andy, you’ve got three days left. And you had your health and everything in place. What would you do for those 30 days? I would I would get on a plane if we could. I’ve always loved to travel. I’m fascinated by seeing different places. I’m someone who just likes to walk around and see different stuff. I get bored sitting down on a beach and my wife just loves to go and sit in the sunshine and chill. And I’m pasternack. Come and go and do this. And I go and see that. I love to see different cities and places to go to South America, um, probably Australia. I took about four months out after I worked for about a year and a half and three friends went and travelled all the way up the East Coast, went down to Melbourne. Just just there was no tomorrows. And for that one time in your life, having no tomorrows was something small. No idea. Don’t let tomorrow get in the way of today. Let’s just absolutely kill it today. Do whatever we want whenever we feel like it’s just such such an amazing mindset to not have to worry about tomorrow. And, you know, my four months in Australia was definitely not tomorrow’s, and yet we didn’t leave much in the tank of that four months of work.

[01:05:46] What about yourself? We are in 30 days left on the planet. Full health. I think I would do my damnedest to get to fill a plane with all of my nearest and dearest, and I would be jetting off to the sunshine and I would be doing everything in my powers to have the best possible signoff. I’d want it to be just one hell of a party and then being able to relax, chill again. I think the whole idea of tomorrow not being of concern would be an absolute ideal. But to be surrounded by your nearest and dearest and a sunset setting. Yeah, that would be where I would want to be. I’d probably throw in some sort of fast cars into that as well with me being a little bit of a petrol head and still have a car mechanic. I’d want that to play a part in that too. But a family would definitely be at the forefront of that.

[01:06:37] And friends for guys, it’s been an absolute pleasure. Thank you so much for your time today. It’s been great.

[01:06:45] This is Dental Leaders, the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging Leaders history. Your house, Payman, Langroudi and Prav Solanki.

[01:07:01] 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 got some value out of it if you did get some value out of it. Think about subscribing and if you would share this with a friend who you think might get some value out of it, too. Thank you so, so, so much for listening. Thanks. And don’t forget our six star rating.

[00:00:00] You can buy companies which mine Krypto and own crypto, and those prices tend to rally and fluctuate with the crypto bull market. So one that there’s been a lot of hype around is one called Argo Blockin. And I wish I would have bought this thing a lot sooner because it’s went up a thousand percent since about six months ago, which is crazy. OK, I still don’t think the bull market for crypto is over personally. Quite a few reasons that are not for people with. But suffice to say, I still think it’s got some leeway to grow.

[00:00:30] All right. I’m not a financial advisor.

[00:00:32] By the way, this is Denzel Leaders, the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging leaders in history. Your highs and lows include Saline King.

[00:00:58] It gives me great pleasure to introduce James Martin to the latest podcast and a different twist on dentistry today. It’s all about investing. James Martin is set up a group, what was it, six months ago?

[00:01:11] Yeah, well, I don’t even think it’s six months quite yet. And yeah, it seems to have somewhat expanded over time. And it’s all centered around dentists and their finances and investing, just as you touched upon there a minute ago, is still sinking in for me. This is quite got to the level that it has. But I’m loving. It is great.

[00:01:31] So dentists who invest is the group and I think we could all do with a bit of advice or help or direction in how we can make our money work a little bit harder for us. So, James, we usually start this off by just sort of asking how you where you grew up, but in your background, how you got into dentistry and then let’s go onto the investment path.

[00:01:51] Totally. Guys, thank you so much for having me. First of all, I’m looking forward to this one. I have my own podcast, but it’s nice to be to show you to be on the other foot a little bit and not take the lead for once and just speak a little bit about myself and get to know you guys. But yeah, sure thing. So I don’t know if anybody’s detected the accent or not yet. I think it’s somewhat when since time. But I am originally from Northern Ireland, so I spent the first 18 years of my life growing up over there. And I then came to Leeds in England when I was 19 to study dentistry. I’m not one of these people who how can I say I don’t know if it was my calling to be a dentist, or at least I didn’t at the time. But I do really like it. And I must say, but I have had this strange journey where it’s kind of ebbed and flowed. I’ve been the guy who loves it. I’ve been the guy who’s less enthused about it many times. But I’m happy that where I am at the minute in life, I do quite like it. But yeah, I came to Leeds in I think it was two thousand and eleven and I don’t actually ever really been to England once before that. So it was a bit of a leap of faith for me. But best decision I ever made, you know, coming to England, seeing it’s quite a different culture from Northern Ireland. I think the people are quite different. It took me a while to adapt. Most definitely. When I go back home, I speak like the queen, according to my granny. But I think that accents are all relative, you know what I mean? Whereas over here I’m like definitely a foreigner. So it’s a bit of a curious one.

[00:03:20] Is that outside of the accent? How do you how do you see a difference through the cultural differences between one hundred percent, the sense of humour, one hundred percent, a sense of humour.

[00:03:31] You know, Father Ted. Yeah. Yeah. That is like the zenith of comedy in Ireland. OK, and whilst I’m not saying that people in England, you know, they don’t get it or they don’t like it, but I don’t know if you quite call it the pinnacle of comedy, this very there’s other things like I don’t really know. I think I really like Peepshow. I think that’s the pinnacle of comedy. I think that’s awesome. But I also like only fools and horses. And to me, that’s the quintessential idea of British humour. And maybe I think that I’ve evolved a little bit as well, because I’ve been over here for so long and I used to not really get only fools and horses when I was I lived over there and I find it quite funny. I’ll put it on just out of interest just to watch it.

[00:04:19] And then also, Yorkshire is the Texas of Britain.

[00:04:23] Yeah, it’s definitely got its own kind of. Yeah. Culture and what have you. Do you know what I found out about Yorkshire culture the other day of what that cheese called? Oh my God. I’ve had a lot of drawing a blank that cheese. And you eat it with the Christmas pudding. Yorkshire cheese.

[00:04:42] No, no, it’s it’s got wensleydale. Yes.

[00:04:48] That freaked me out. That freaked me the hell out. When I find out that you eat that with you with Christmas pudding. I’ve never seen it in my life before.

[00:05:00] It’s not a thing outside of Yorkshire, listen.

[00:05:04] Wow, I thought I thought I understood you guys and then I saw that and just go right back to square one. Back to square one, hand on heart. I’d never seen that before. And maybe that’s me. I don’t know.

[00:05:18] Or maybe that’s just Yorkshire people saying, I really, honestly don’t know that the funny thing about accents, then you go, oh, in the same spot like the Queen. So I grew up in a place called Lake Fiqh, Mancunian accent and then go off to uni, come back and I’m chatting away to my brother on the phone to one of my mates to Oxford and turn to like posh individual. Right. So super posh accent. And then at home, like, I’ll speak to Peyman quite a lot at home. I’m speaking like this, I don’t know Mancunian of whatever I speak to penlight. You turn into a posh you know what, and I’m like a chameleon to my accent, just sense to change. And even on this podcast, you’ll probably find there’ll be some very posh prep and somewhere is Northern Trust. So it’s these things all a bit odd for me.

[00:06:08] It happens. We all do th=at to a degree. I’m with you on that one. I do that to what we like. As a dental student, I was not that committed to dentistry. I was very much the archetype of a student and not I like to go out. My main priority was on the academic side for the first three years. And then I really realised that when you hit fourth and fifth year, the work goes up quite a big notch. And I recognized that I needed to up my game and then I just became fully embroiled in it. And that was the point where I started reading all our books about dentistry, going to extra lectures where there’s opportunities to have them. And maybe I got I got loads more interested in it towards the end. Where are you right now, your associate? Yes, that’s right.

[00:06:57] Ok, so tell us about how this investment so the journey started.

[00:07:02] Yeah, cool. Sure. So I probably did investing the wrong way round in that I traded before what I tried to trade didn’t go very well before I actually started thinking about long term investments, which is the clever way to do it. But that was born out of my total fundamental lack of knowledge about what I was even doing. Quite so. Quick question that James trading long term investment. Just break down the basics for me. Yeah, sure. So I guess an investor is someone who seeks to tie up their money in some sort of asset and look to the very, very long run to gain their profits and accept that there’s a possibility that it may go up and down. But their fundamental philosophy is that most assets go up in value over time for reasons we can go into later if you if you’re interested, so that that is their fundamental philosophy. And people will do that with index funds, bonds, gold, stuff like that, crypto less. So it’s less well established, although I think with Bitcoin it is possible to do that. But anyway, that’s the story for another day or perhaps later on for interest. And then the other thing I was going to say, trading is someone they basically seek to increase their capital over a very short space of time. So you’ll invest with the idea that something is going to go up or if you’re going to short something that is going to go down in value maybe quite soon. So if you’re a day trader, maybe it’ll be the same day. If you’re a swing trader, maybe that’ll be over a few months, or if you’re slightly more a long term holder, then maybe that’ll be a few weeks or so. Maybe that’ll be a few months to years, maybe something like that.

[00:08:41] So you started off trading. Did you lose some money? Did you get any highs? Lows? Did you think you.

[00:08:49] Yeah, well, there was there was a big low. There was a there was a I got into crypto when Bitcoin was on the news the last time it got really big and there was a massive bull market which was towards the end of twenty, seventeen early twenty eighteen. And my story was that I’d heard of Bitcoin. My friend had it in university in twenty twelve and I think he regrets that he didn’t hold it. I think that was one of his biggest regrets in life, that he didn’t hold it because I remember it being two hundred and fifty quid and I remember we were all laughing because we just thought that was extortionate to mean. And yeah my friend had it in university. That’s when I first heard of it and I first heard of the price and it going up and I didn’t really know that much about it or what it was and that tickled my pickle or that kind of got me thinking about it. And then I didn’t really think a whole lot about it for a long time.

[00:09:46] And then when we got to twenty seventeen, when there was this massive bull market and it basically culminated with Bitcoin being on the news quite often being on BBC and people saying things like. It started out in January that year, I think it was about eleven hundred dollars, twelve hundred dollars and it became twenty thousand dollars before the end of the year. And people were saying things like, how much can this thing continue to go up? It’s insane. It was in the newspaper. It had reached that peak saturation where it had culminated in general retail buying. So people who don’t necessarily know that much about investing were getting in. So even at the time, I knew it was a bubble. I knew that it was going to pop basically, and that it couldn’t continue to go up a lot more than what it had done already. So I thought to myself, OK, I know this is a bubble. I’m smarter than this, right? I’m smarter than this. OK, so I’m going to wait for the price to go up a lot.

[00:10:42] Then I’m just going to let it go down and then that’s when I’m going to get and I’m going to buy. OK, but the trouble was I had no idea how long the bear market that follows a bull market in Bitcoin is, and it’s usually about three or four years. OK, so I just thought, yeah, a few months will be all right. So I kind of bought this and I didn’t quite buy it at the peak. Then I held on and I held on and I did everything wrong that someone who’s trading it will try to do. I didn’t put a sale order in. If the price went past a certain limit, I became too attached to a particular crypto because I got emotionally invested in it. That crypto was XP and also another massive red flag about a newbie investor is if you know even a tiny amount about crypto, you’ll also know that XP is not really a project that a lot of people trust. So as far as the rookie mistakes go, it was like I had a big lesson. I was just taking them all off. But I didn’t even know that at the time. And I wish I would have just sold it, to be honest, if it’s a total waste of money in the end.

[00:11:49] And then I wound up transferring most of it to the wrong wallet and I lost it basically. So, again, another huge a huge no no. Another huge mistake. So that kind of got me thinking. And I thought, what separates these people who know quite a lot about crypto and they’re able to make money versus me is obviously a knowledge gap. I’m not inspired this journey into reading and learning about what money is and what crypto is, because if you know what money is, crypto starts to make a lot more sense. And then it just went from there. And I don’t just buy crypto. I don’t think that everybody should put their life savings and crypto. I do enjoy trading it, but that’s just my inclination or proclivity, I suppose. But what I do is I do some investing as well. I buy indexes, bonds and gold, OK? And those are things that you can seek to increase. You can seek to use to increase your capital over time and possibly act as a pension fund. But again, it all depends on your beliefs in the market. Hope that was a good answer I found, because I felt like a wall of water down there.

[00:12:52] When you said you went from being a total amateur to it sounds like you kind of know yourself. Now, if I was a total amateur, I wouldn’t get involved in investment. Have you got a few resources like books and things that you should read?

[00:13:07] One hundred percent, one hundred percent, and you’ve hit the nail on the head when you asked me about resources, I think books are the ultimate resource because of how much information that is condensed into. It’s basically distilled knowledge from an expert. And yeah, you can watch YouTube videos, but you’ll never know until you start reading a lot of books. But it may maybe your knowledge just won’t be as farsighted. I think personally and I like physical books as well, because what you can do is you could put Post-it on them and then what?

[00:13:36] What are some books like? What would be a good starting point was a good book.

[00:13:39] Yeah, sure. So yeah, one of my favorite books. I like the physical books because you can actually put posters in it and my favorite book of all time, people are going to start thinking that me and this guy have some sort of business arrangement because I talk about it so much. But It’s Hard on the World by Andrew Craig. And the reason why that is such a good book is that it presumes that you have no knowledge beforehand of what investing is, what money is. All of these things it talks about what the limits, why there are massive drawbacks in keeping all your wealth in cash, which I was one hundred percent that person before. And it talks about how the stock market and certain investments because of high cash is created and printed over time. They’re inherently predisposed to go up in value. And you can take advantage of this effect to multiply wealth and have a pension pot when you’re older and it’s hard to do it safely. And he actually makes the point in this book that it’s actually safer to diversify than it is to keep all your money in cash, which kind of flips on its head when most people look at it. And that was a mind blowing thing for me.

[00:14:47] So I’m going to ask some silly questions because I’m totally cool. People always say diversify your portfolio to limit your risk.

[00:14:56] Does that not limit your upside to a can?

[00:15:00] But I think you have to look over what time frame you want to draw profit. OK, so someone might come get me get rich quick.

[00:15:08] Yeah, yeah. We’re on the same page. Nice one.

[00:15:12] I think the thing with that is the problem is you have to have a plan before you go into it and you have to think to yourself, over what period of time am I likely to make some money or over what period of time am I expecting to draw some profits? It so let’s say if you’re someone who’s a trader to actually create something, I don’t think a lot of people realize just how much time you have to spend monitoring it and setting trade alert. And it’s basically a black hole for your time, and especially for a lot of a lot of people listen to this will be Dentists’, OK? And we’re already time per people the number of hoops we have to jump through just to be a dentist. And when you kind of keeping patients happy, et cetera, et cetera, it’s very difficult to do, I think, personally. So I think what you have to do is you have to say to yourself, over what period of time am I looking to draw a profit? And if you’re not thinking about doing that in the short term, it’s easier to spread your risk and diversify. Does that make sense? And yet you might be the person who buys a lot of stocks and you might get very wealthy.

[00:16:13] But it makes some sense. It makes some sense. But let’s say I let’s imagine I think Bitcoin is the thing to invest in. Yeah. And this AFCO one hundred thousand dollars to invest and you come to me say the whole hundred thousand in Bitcoin, thirty thousand in Bitcoin and then spread to other seventy thousand of course homes and stocks and properties or whatever. Yeah. It’s my information was right that Bitcoin is going to go up. Only thirty thousand of my cash is going to understand the downside risk. But surely the upside is.

[00:16:43] Well it is, but then it’s about capturing the right train at the right time, you know what I mean? So you’re quite right. I think Bitcoin is probably going to rally for a few months more. But the bear market that follows Bitcoin, it usually draws down 80 percent in value. So, yeah, I do see I do see entirely where you’re coming from. I think at that point you have to a know a lot about the particular asset that your investment and know when to get out, which not everybody does. And B, also just cross your fingers a little bit because investing is a bit more of a well, there’s there’s a risk to that, isn’t there? It’s not a guarantee. Whereas if you if you spread it across other things, then you don’t have to be that involved with how you manage it. And that’s why it can be beneficial for most people. And remember, the goal is the goal is just to make money overall long enough over a certain period of time. The goal is not even to be the best. The goal is just to be better than cash. Does that answer your question? I hope it does.

[00:17:41] Yes, I think it does, and I’d like to just dig a bit deeper into Krypto James because until I read, I read a book called The Bitcoin Standard, and until I read that, I thought crypto was some darker a load of bollocks, basically. Yeah. And then I read that and the whole money story as well. Right. How it was the value of money, how you print more, you devalue fiat currency, et cetera, et cetera, and how valuable something like Bitcoin could be. Now, to me, I’m one of these people who super detailer and say I’m not the sort of guy who’s just going to chuck a hundred grand into Bitcoin without knowing it inside out, or at least so. So I’m spending a lot of time now reading books, watching things, etc., but I’m still incredibly wet behind the ears. What I’d like you to do is just give us a give us a summary of, first of all, what Bitcoin is, why it’s going up in value. And then also just a bit of insight into these old coins, so to speak. So all the coins and I’ve heard people do in 10x hundreds on these other coins, but everyone’s just talking about Bitcoin.

[00:18:52] I think the biggest to answer your question, I heard a really nice description of how Bitcoin works the other day, which ties in the fundamentals of what it is, but also it’s in a kind of a way that we can relate to. So if you think about a bank, a bank has a ledger in it. And let’s go back to what the sixteen hundred is. When we had Italian banks that were first kind of gaining traction, whatever. So in the bank, you’d have a big book called A Ledger, OK? And in that ledger there would be a scribe. Maybe there would be a back up of the ledger. I don’t know, something like that. Just so that they could compare it. You’d have a person who would write down Mr. Jones or is this much money? He’s just given someone else this much money. Now he has this much. All the transactions were held in there and there needed to be a record of that because no one could retain that information. All right. Now, imagine a modern bank that stored in a computer, OK? The transactions, the how much money there is in every according to what, et cetera, et cetera. It’s all on a big computer. OK, now what Bitcoin is take that computer, make it into many computers that are spread throughout the world that are all talking to each other and confirming this ledger at the same time. And also that no one owns because it is decentralized, of course. And that’s what Bitcoin is. I hope that does not make sense for of people. And I think that’s the nicest way of explaining it succinctly.

[00:20:19] Yeah. From from what I’ve read is that the block chain is essentially the ledger. Yeah. Which is a record of every single transaction that’s there for life, as I understand it. Yeah. And the whole decentralization of it is basically you’re not tied down to NatWest or whoever it is, it’s and it’s run by an open source community of miners or computers or whatever you want to call them.

[00:20:49] So there actually is a five man team that the guy, Satoshi Nakamoto, the alias of the individual or people, group of people who created it, passed on the rights to OK, so but the miners have the say as to who implements the software because it’s and it’s just it’s consensus. So you’d have to get the majority of miners to agree to a change as well. Makes sense. Yeah.

[00:21:17] So I think to answer your question, the most amazing thing that I learned about money that allowed me to make a lot more sense of what Bitcoin is, was the fact that money only so money when I spend money, I mean pawns on a currency, not gold and silver, which can also be money, but I mean specifically currency. Once upon a time, you could trade your currency. A British one British pound is a pound of gold. That’s what it was. OK, they changed that in nineteen fourteen. They unpegged the value of the point to the gold to fight Germany. They needed more money but they didn’t have enough gold. So when you know that, that only retained its value because people after that the pound meant nothing, OK, they had Bretton Woods, which was something slightly different, but that’s now gone.

[00:22:07] But after that point, there’s no actual value that that has, apart from the fact that other people agree that it has value. Do you see what I mean? Because if you go to a bank, you can’t get gold. Gold is the fundamental money. And again, people only think gold has value because it looks pretty. It actually has very limited use. So value is something that’s actually more of a consensus in society. And when you know that when you know that value comes from consensus, why can something like Bitcoin not have value as well? Which is suppose? To be a in a deflationary inherent store of value over time, do you see what I mean?

[00:22:46] Because no one can arbitrarily created Silver Strip from understand obviously with gold scarcity as well, I assume plays a big role in its inherent value. And then, as you mentioned, with the gold standard that you used to be able to assume and walk into a bank and say, I can have my gold worth in this right.

[00:23:05] I promise to pay the bearer on demand the value of one pound of gold. That’s what it said on British banknotes. But it doesn’t anymore.

[00:23:13] Yes, but it doesn’t. And so you could back that up. And then. And now. Now it’s like you say, it’s been unpegged. And what is the value in Bitcoin? It’s scarcity as well. The fact that there’s only, say, twenty one million coins.

[00:23:28] Partly, partly so.

[00:23:30] There is five things that people attribute its value to. So scarcity is one of them previously speed of transactions, cost of transactions because it’s cheaper. And then you might also say, well, scarcity is the fifth one tied on talk our store a store of value. OK, so those are it’s five use cases as such.

[00:23:54] What about crime? About crime with the with this digital currency? I’m sure this is it’s a really good way to wash money.

[00:24:03] Yeah. I mean, ultimately, bitcoin is only psuedo psuedo, private, OK, because you still have a publicly available address, which if someone takes hard enough, they can find that it’s linked to your IP address. So then you have to get into virtual private networks and things like that. Inevitably, there is going to be some people who use it for that means because it’s a peer to peer system. But I think that with dollars as well and porns, you’re always going to get those bad actors no matter what I feel like, because Bitcoin has been around for so long, it legitimizes itself longer and longer as time goes on. I think it’s inevitable that you’re going to have some bad actors involved with it just because of what drew you back to.

[00:24:58] I’ve never invested in have a list of no investment.

[00:25:03] Now, what do I have to do but just break that down for someone who’s never done it before.

[00:25:10] What does someone like me. Sure, sure. Sure, sure. So I think the first thing to do is, is to work out how much you are prepared to invest just broadly, not just in crypto, and then only attribute a small portion of that to crypto because no one ultimately knows where it’s going to go. And it’s best to diversify, of course. So a rule of thumb, just shooting from the hip. Maybe you might like to have six months to a year off cash reserves that you can use should there be a rainy day, should you lose your job, et cetera, et cetera, just so that you’re protected? I mean, even though cash has all these issues and problems that we that people in the Bitcoin community philosophically disagree with, the fact of the matter is, if you go to the shop, they don’t ask for Bitcoin, they ask for points, you know what I mean? At least for the time being, and spread your risk, of course. Then after that, you might say, alright, well, I’ve got my cash reserve, my emergency fund. Maybe I’ll look to invest and grow my money over time, which is fine. And then you might like to say, what’s my risk profile like? What am I expecting to get out of crypto? Am I someone who’s going to go in and get when I think that the the bull market is over, which it probably will be in about six or seven months, it usually rallies for ten months after it breaks its all time high.

[00:26:28] We’re already about two or three months into that. OK, so are you someone who’s going to be monitoring it and try to take some of your money off the table when you think it comes to the end of the bull market? Or are you someone who wishes to buy it because you believe in the long run that this is going to be the global reserve currency? This is going to be something special, and you wish to own a part of that and you wish to protect your wealth in that fashion. There’s a really interest not to go off too much of a tangent. There’s an interesting website called Block Fine, which you can get a loan in cash, OK? And you can use your Bitcoin as collateral. And because it’s a loan, there’s zero tax on it.

[00:27:08] So say I put up one Bitcoin, I get forty thousand dollars for it. That’s my loan. Obviously I pay that back with interest on it, but pay it back with interest on it. I still have my bitcoin, OK, and then I can just use that bitcoin as collateral further down the line, which is really interesting. So this is something that’s quite ushe. I only became aware of this about six months ago. So you might say to yourself, actually, I want to hold Bitcoin long term and use it as collateral for loans. I really I don’t know or you might like to say, actually, I believe in this as a pension. I wish to hold part of this on this for for this.

[00:27:42] I’ve decided I’m going to buy some Bitcoin. I’ve got my 50 grand. What I do next.

[00:27:47] Ok, fair enough. The kind of meat and potatoes we actually logistically do. OK, fair enough. So I would first of all, find a reputed website on which to buy it. I personally like the website Cracken, so it has a UK based, has got a UK outlet or branch or whatever, and you can send Pynes to it, you can buy Bitcoin directly in point. What I like as well is that when you take your money, your bitcoin out of the exchange you pay for, well, you don’t pay a percentage, you pay 10 points and it’s capped at that limit. So if you’re putting over a Grendon, then you begin to benefit from that arrangement at that point, because normally it’s only one percent are normally they will charge you one percent to withdraw or not point one percent in those realms. So Coinbase is like one percent, which is quite high finance and things like that are usually like point one percent to withdraw your Bitcoin. So your benefit from an economy of scale at that point. And then you can just put your Bitcoin on a wallet.

[00:28:50] What does that mean? It was actually a wallet. Yeah. So a wallet is just a digital literally just a digital wallet, a digital kind of place that you can access your bitcoin from, which only you have custody of, not the exchange, because there has been cases in the past where exchanges get hacked. The reason I recommend cracken is because it’s never been hacked and it also has bank tier level security. It’s recognized as a bank and you US law. You can only get this legal status when you have a certain level of cybersecurity. I don’t, to my knowledge, know of any other exchange that has not and therefore it is to surface. Some people are content to leave it on an exchange. That’s that’s just a philosophical kind of maybe like a difference there. Some people the true the hardcores on the people who, while they see Bitcoin more from the point of view, have taken back control, those people will never be content to leave it on an exchange. So then that’s a USB drive, then a cool wallet is a USB drive. Yeah. So that’s considered the highest level of security because from your public address there is another sixty four digit on letter Freers, which is your private key. You can turn a private key into a public address, but you can’t figure out you can’t unscramble a public key to figure out a private address.

[00:30:17] OK, so this private key that you have, this is yours. You never share that with anyone. And that is your password to access the block chain where your crypto is stored. And the reason people really like called wallets is because those are not private key. That never leaves that wallet, whereas most wallets, the private key is actually stored on the computer. So if someone has is able to hack your computer and you don’t have a strong enough security suite that can, in theory, take your Bitcoin. What happens if you lose your wallet as long as you have the private key, which you would always back up? So what they want most wallet providers do is to give you a 20 forward seat phrase. You write that down because otherwise is just sixty four letters and numbers of gibberish, you know what I mean? It’s just something a bit more tangible. And then from that, they make you calculate your private key on the wallet. But it never it never leaves this little USB drive. The computer just uses the wallet to access it. It doesn’t actually ever get that information. And that’s why it’s called wallet. And they’re considered to be the safest.

[00:31:26] There’s some examples of questions you’ll get you get you must be getting a lot of questions from Dantas, right? Yeah, and I noticed you said, of course, for Bitcoin buying Bitcoin as well.

[00:31:37] Yeah, that’s a work in progress. Is that one of the first two making, of course, is a lot of work.

[00:31:43] Well, I kind of I realize now I have maybe bitten off a lot more than I could chew.

[00:31:48] I think as well as just when I want to make it of a good standard that people are going to actually learn. And it’s kind of one of those things. It’s almost like a black hole. And I think I’m in danger of maybe putting too much information in at this point. So I need to just figure out how can I make this really useful, but also make it still accessible to most people. And it takes time. It really does.

[00:32:12] What would you say? What would you say the most common mistakes that people make when it comes to investing?

[00:32:18] I would say so. Broadly speaking, investing, trading, investing, whatever you like. I would say the very first thing is to have an idea of what sort of time frame you want to get your money out, OK? Because if you go into something and you know that you believe that inherently it’s going to go up over value over time. The S&P Five Hundred Index in America created in nineteen fifty seven on average, went up by 10 percent every year on average. All right. Now there’s going to be Dawna’s obviously, but on average, it went up 10 percent every year. So when you know that piece of information, you are so much more immune to the negative, the negative press and the negativity that’s chucked at you because you’ll go into something and you’ll say, OK, I have a Daunia, OK, is two in it. And Wall Street went went to pot, whatever.

[00:33:09] But you’ll know that if you wait a long enough time, you’ll be able to increase your money. So for me, if I go into something and I know what I’m investing in and I know over what period of time I want to draw money, then I can draw a lot of.

[00:33:25] Yes, I won’t lose any sleep at night. And those mistake people make. What you’re saying is, first of all, is to define that period of time. Definitely. Absolutely.

[00:33:36] Yeah. Time frame. Biggest mistake, I think, as well as that is not being prepared to understand just how much you have to monitor something to understand its daily price fluctuations and maybe expecting that you can be ready to make a quick buck. But again, not really having an idea of how much you have to know about something to do that I think is all about picking one asset class and just learning the absolute hell out of it to make money and having an idea of just how much time you have to spend front of the computer to do that.

[00:34:05] And if it’s a dent, if you’re a dentist and you probably don’t have that much time, then understanding that I’m not trying to be that person.

[00:34:13] And I can imagine moments where you’d be caught in the middle of a long ground threat and missed some moment in the market, also some lawsuits.

[00:34:25] And I recently read a story from Robbie Burns Naked Trader book, the one about spread betting. Spread betting is not for the faint of heart, let me tell you that. Oh, my God. If you have a professional account, as they’ve recently changed the rules, but you used to be able to do this with an amateur client. No, it’s just a professional. So it’s a little bit more ring-fence. But when you trade on leverage, your risk is unlimited. Your risk is not just the money that you put in. OK, so if you if you buy 10 grand of shares and you have 10 leverage, then if that moves 10 grand against you, then you’ve literally you’ve lost 100 grand. And yeah, they’ll collapse your trade after a while, but not before you have a lot of money. OK, now I was written about some that it actually was a dentist as well. He specifically mentions his friend who was a dentist in his book, and he managed to lose something like 70 grand after a one hour dental appointment because it moves so fast against him and so hard that his stop loss, it didn’t even trigger because there wasn’t enough buy, there wasn’t enough buy orders in the market, which can hardly be guaranteed. Well, yeah, that’s it. Apparently you can take a box to guarantee it. And he didn’t take it out, but it’s safe to say he did take that box. And while that’s the sort of stuff that I don’t I don’t have the nerve to do stuff like that, monist Brad Batton is probably not for me, really.

[00:35:55] I mean, the clues, the clues in the name, like betting.

[00:35:59] Betting. Yeah, that’s it. Yeah, that’s it.

[00:36:02] So listen, but if you you’re an associate now and most associates would be I mean, let’s face it, no one in investing is have some money to invest. Right. Spend spend less than you earn most to be doing fine. You, the ones who invest will be doing that number to someone like you. OK, most associates would be looking to start taking practice or whatever. And have you had to look at that? I mean, you know, looking at the way you’re thinking now, starting the practice is going to take a lot of your time. And I guess it’s a risk return kind of question I’m asking. But, you know, if you just say you’ve saved two hundred grand, you could put that into practice. You could put that leverage it onto the property, you could buy some Bitcoin or whatever. Have you thought to yourself which way you’re going to sell?

[00:36:57] It sounds like you know why it’s so curious that you asked me that? Because I was just thinking about this yesterday. I personally don’t think I would like to own a dental practice. And it’s something I’ve been weighing up in my head for quite a while. And I think if I was to look at things in terms of return on investment over a long enough period of time, I first of all, don’t think that that would be the most effective place that one could put it for a lot of people. And I think that they’d be surprised to learn that once they start reading just what you can do with it, when you have a little bit of knowledge and good on an expectation of what to what might happen. Now, that’s just for me. Other people might be different, I think, as well as that. When you run a dental practice, the people management side, there’s so many moving parts in a dental practice.

[00:37:52] It just seems to me like it would be very frazzling for someone who owns it. You have to keep all the dentists happy people. The nurse is happy and you have to keep your patients happy. And by the way, there’s thousands of those, OK, you know what I mean?

[00:38:04] There’s so much regulation. It’s like it’s like a hand on your neck. It’s like I can’t see that getting better any time soon. And I just think even if I could and let’s turn that on what it’s head turn on its head. What I was saying just a minute ago, even if I could make less money from investing versus owning a dental practice, I think the lifestyle than investing really sensibly in stocks and things over a long enough period of time and having an understanding of that, the lifestyle out of Fauji is there’s a big argument to be made about that in itself, you know what I mean?

[00:38:40] Taking back your free time, et cetera, et cetera. And these are just conclusions that I’ve come to. People might be listening. I’m I might even be wrong. I don’t know. I just think from the lens and perspective I have on it at the minute, I just don’t think it’s for me. I’m always going to be happy. I’ll be a dedicated associate, you know. And honestly, I really love dentistry. I love it. I love doing a good job.

[00:39:03] Almost like two, three years out of university.

[00:39:07] Just over five, actually. No, no, I beg your pardon. Just coming up to five.

[00:39:10] Just come over up. That might change for you as well.

[00:39:15] Thank you for the journey back. The journey, isn’t it? And I might look, I might change my opinion totally six months time.

[00:39:21] The reason why a lot of associates become principal example is to do so little time to control. And if you’re happy, you also settle in long term associates. Sometimes we’ve seen on this podcast about the superstars who want to do their own marketing and control their own destiny in that sense. But I mean, I’m interested in this journey that is gone down now that you’ve decided to become an expert so quickly. I mean, as far as I can remember, last time Bitcoin was a twenty thousand day before yesterday. Yeah. Are you that kind of person that you jumps deep into things?

[00:40:09] Yeah, I am. I am. I think I feel like for me, I’d rather concentrate on the two things that I’ve spent most of the last three or four years learning about or dentistry and investing know. And I feel like if you’re going to for me, if I want to do it because I realize the power of it, I know if I put a lot of effort in that, it’ll be worth it on my behalf. And I feel like as well, for me personally, I’m very conscious that I’m only twenty nine and there’ll be people listening to us who are old, had no say. What does this guy really know about investing? I know what the books say, but have I been investing for so many years that I’ve made millions from stocks and shares. I can never say that to someone, but all I can say is that I have met people who’ve used these principles who are much older than me, and they have got to where they want to be in that respect. So if we can’t go off evidence like that, I don’t know what we can go off. I feel like the crypto thing is when you’re maybe someone more of my generation being my age plays into your hands a little bit more because you’re perhaps portrayed to be more ofay with computers. And that’s not why I went down that path, persay. But I feel like maybe that’s why that my who I am, it’s sort of helps in that respect a little bit about knowing things, about crypto and trading it and et cetera, et cetera.

[00:41:42] James talked to me about portfolio or what you would consider to be a safe spread of portfolio. And I want you to talk particularly about tax wrappers as well, because Dentists’ right. No matter what gains you’re going to realize, more often than not, the top end of the of the tax bracket. Right. As as a practitioner or as an associate, you’re going to be paying at the top end of the market with tax. So just talk to us about how you can sort of maximize those gains and minimize taxes in the best possible way. But also as a modern portfolio, let’s say you had 30, 40, 50 grand a year to invest. What would what would be a safe long term portfolio look like percentage so much in stocks and shares in the S&P 500 and how that can be maximized so that any gains that you get, you minimising the the downside on the tax code.

[00:42:43] Fair enough. So first of all, if we look at what a portfolio is, different people, different people will want different things out of it. So let’s look at someone who’s my age, who’s twenty nine. My priority is to grow my capital because I haven’t worked for as long as someone is 50 and 60, I won’t have as much money as someone like that. And as well as that, I’m able to take more risk even over a period of the medium term, maybe five years, 10 years. So even if there’s a crash, chances are my money is going to recover because of what we said earlier about the S&P. Five hundred it increase in 10 percent every year over time. What if I buy in at two thousand and it you know, it didn’t recover again for however many years after that. So for me personally, my portfolio might be geared, geared a little bit to more towards risk than someone who’s a little bit older than me. So there is a rule in investing. Now, this is just a broad rule. It’s called the rule of one hundred. So you might say you take your age and you say my age is the point of the percentage of assets that I want to put into lower risk investments and the number that’s left over from deducting it from one hundred. That’s the figure that I’m happy to take more risk with. So for someone like me, it might be 70, 30, and I’ll say, OK, 30 percent in bonds, 70 percent in stocks, something like that.

[00:44:04] Because stocks can fluctuate more in the medium term. They still go up in value long over long enough periods of time. The. Don’t forget, you also get dividends from stocks as well, which you can reinvest to OK, and bonds, maybe I’ll just want to preserve my capital a little bit. So, again, I feel like that’s something that we could go into a huge amount of detail about. But I’ll draw a line under that there and just say that for people who wish to invest, it’s more by having an idea of what you want to get out of it, bearing in mind and bearing in mind your risk profile and bearing in mind your age. I hope that was sufficient for that one, because I feel like I could I could talk a lot more on that. But there’s two other things that I want to flesh out there. You’ve asked about tax wrappers in the U.K. We have this amazing, two amazing tax wrappers called a sip called and I called ISA accounts. OK, now there’s different types of ISA, but I think that one that everybody should own is a stocks and shares ISA or maybe most people should own stocks and shares ISA and a stocks and shares ISA. You get taxed before you go in because it’s your income tax and what’s left goes into your cash, goes into your stocks and shares.

[00:45:20] Isa, you can put up to 20 grand a year in ISIS. Anything you make in that isa you can make wild profits, you can make a million and that isa and it’s all yours because it’s all free. OK, I don’t know if you guys have an ISA. I do. Yeah I’m afraid so. We NICE’s though. Can you you could buy exposure to crypto which is something slightly different but you cannot anymore. OK, so recently there’s been a ruling by the FCA on something called Contracts for Difference, which is owning. It’s equivalent to saying I give you something that is imaginary. And that used to be how people get exposure to crypto through those ices. You can’t do that anymore. So to my knowledge, there is no way that you can gain exposure directly to crypto through an ISA. However, you can buy companies which mine crypto and own crypto, and those prices tend to rally and fluctuate with the crypto market. So one that there’s been a lot of hype around is one called Aagot Block Blockin. And I wish I would have bought this thing a lot sooner because it’s went up a thousand percent since about six months ago, which is crazy. OK, I still don’t think the bull market for crypto is over personally. Quite a few reasons that are not for people with. But suffice to say, I still think it’s got some leeway to grow. All right.

[00:46:46] I’m not a financial advisor, by the way.

[00:46:49] There’s no dispute on that.

[00:46:52] But I’m just saying there is another one called Riot Block Chain, which is a similar company. They don’t have quite as much as Aagot. And there was another one I was on I that I only learned about the other day. But the name escapes me, but I haven’t actually invested in Riot. I have got a little bit of Aagot and I was slightly late to the party, but I still have some money.

[00:47:13] I do plan to get out of Aagot before that becomes well before the end of the bull market. I am very conscious that I’m not actually buying Bitcoin, I’m buying a company and to put a lot in any one company. Well, what if the company goes to pot? What if something goes wrong there? I’d be I’d be very careful about that, you know what I mean? But it’s a nice way to spread some risk, definitely. So that’s one thing that I hand on heart think that most people should own a stocks and shares ISA as a first port of call us to invest in. On top of that, you do get twelve thousand three hundred capital gains allowance so you can always invest and take advantage of that. And until you make twelve thousand three hundred in profit, then you won’t owe any tax. OK, and then after that you do have something called a sip self invested personal pension, which is something that it’s got a slightly different erm compared to a stocks and shares isa, because the idea is that it’s supposed to reduce your tax. So when you get into the additional rate tax band, which is like one hundred and fifty grand, it becomes a lot more efficient to own that. However, there is something where an accountant will have to, you’ll have to ask your accountants on this one. But when you earn I think it’s roughly one hundred and twenty thousand, I can’t remember the exact figure. Something weird happens that your personal lines diminishes. And when you get to that point, you actually only for every point that you earn, you only get thirty three P someone told me. So if you’ve got your SIPP because you can use your SIPP, you can put money into your set and it reduces your, your tax band or how much you’re expected to pay in tax, then it becomes that much more efficient to use it at that point than it does prior. So again, something to talk to your accountant about, definitely worth thinking about. I think a stocks and shares ISA for most people is your first port of call.

[00:49:08] And then when it comes to stocks and shares, the average Joe, even me. Exactly what I’m doing right, so well, what do you invest in? You get lucky and stick your shares in Taslim about a year ago. I wish, I wish a lot of people I know go to I can try and get them to run a portfolio for them. What do you do, the same James or you at that point where actually you’re savvy enough to know the highs and lows and make your own decisions and be in control of that?

[00:49:42] There are some people there are some efface that I’ve come across that have this really nice arrangement where you just pay them upfront and then they kind of make a set and forget portfolio, which is a nice arrangement, by the way. And will I ever know as much as someone who does it every day? No chance. OK, so those EFAs are right there. Some of them I have met personally. I do believe they’re very knowledgeable and would probably do a good job and they might save you a little bit of the legwork. OK, the more traditional arrangement is, as you’ve said, they charge you a percentage, OK? Now, the problem with charging somebody a percentage is due to the power of compounding over time. This adds up quite a lot. So there is some I believe there was some figures that I had that I recently was looking at. And it’s something like if you have 20 grand, if you invest 20 grand into your stocks and shares, ISA, you do that for 20 years and you have the power of compounding it is like 12 percent.

[00:50:44] Ok, don’t forget, you reinvest in your profits so you’re making more profits from your profits. And apparently if you do that from your profits and from the 20 grand that you’ve put in, you’ll have one point seven million if you add that that a 12 percent return every year. And let’s say you have an efface figure in there and the EFAs figure is like one, two percent, something like that. If you take that down to 10 percent, then after those 20 years, you have one point three million, which is still nothing to be sniffed that, you know what I mean? But it’s quite a market difference in terms of money there. So all I’m saying is that you can get an IFA. A lot of them do struggle to beat the market. OK, so if we look at managed funds versus active funds, people who add the funds that collections of shares that are controlled by some individuals that make decisions on buying and selling, you’d be surprised at the number of those that actually can’t beat the market.

[00:51:38] So I believe in America, if you have ninety three percent of active funds cannot beat the S&P 500, which is just which is basically just the market over a certain period of time. And it’s because of their fees. And we could draw a parallel between that and a financial adviser. Now, again, again, some people will just be more comfortable with offloading that on to someone else. But it’s less that I think that I know more about that. I think that’s slightly an Oregon thing to say, but more that I think that the cards are stacked in my favor myself. I hope that makes sense. Yeah.

[00:52:14] And the compounding argument definitely holds in that sense.

[00:52:18] And having the knowledge obviously, as well on this on this podcast, we kind of ask the question sometimes about these clinical mistakes for you kind of want to hit you is the best thing to say to me.

[00:52:30] Oh, man. So I don’t want to have a fair amount of money in that krypto that I told you about earlier. XP sent it all to the repo. Yeah, it is. Yeah, yeah, it is. Repo. I sent it to the wrong wallet and that’s a synonym for saying in crypto that basically I’m never going to see this money ever again. And I realized that I’d done it and I just I just closed the laptop and I didn’t mean crypto. We weren’t friends for about a month after that. I just I couldn’t even bring myself to look at it. I was so upset. It was quite a it was a fair amount of money. And what you have to bear in mind is the money that you lose is also the gains that you miss out on further down the line when it does start going well. So maybe you can tell my voice. I’m still getting over it a little bit, but it’s OK.

[00:53:23] It’s OK. Is there somebody out there with a wallet that just got out there for free, but that went up in the precise amount that I that I sent to them.

[00:53:35] Their balance went up that day by that precise amount. Yes, there will be. There will be. So, as I said, possible you go wallet address. Yeah. So I know because so you’ve got a wallet address, the wallet addresses. Sixty four characters in numbers. OK, so if you send it to an invalid wallet address it’ll just get bounced back to you. OK, if you send it to an address that’s valid then someone’s balance will go up so you won’t get it back and it’s gone. Are you with me. Yeah. So I didn’t I know that someone has this because I didn’t get it back.

[00:54:13] How did you even stickied a valid wallet address that belonged to someone else and wasn’t yours?

[00:54:21] So what I did was I copied it and I pasted it into my finance account. But I can only theorize that I must have hit a key at some point or I must have copied and pasted the wrong address, just not really paying attention. I usually do a small task transaction nowadays to understand that I’ve got the right address before forwarding more money to it. But this was when I was a little bit more naive, a little bit went on the years I knew last about what I was doing. This was a few years ago. So yeah, it happened. I learned the hard way. I hope I’ve actually had a few people contact me before who’ve done it. Or you can. What you can also do is you can also send it on the wrong network. And then again, it can while it’s gone really at that point. So anybody is listening. By all means, crypto is a fun thing to do. Please, please, please send a test transaction every single time until you know that that wallet works, because I could have saved myself a lot of hassle if I would have done that in the first place. Or this is why a lot of people don’t like to take the picture off the exchange because they don’t have to worry about transferring it around.

[00:55:37] What about the opposite? What about once when you did a great Trigorin percentage gain that you’ve had on something?

[00:55:45] My best friend, I’ve had a few things do ten times before, a few things. It’s kind of time frame. Yeah, well, see, this is something that I was going to say. So in crypto, I think a lot of people hear about the monumental overnight games, but this was over the course of about two to three weeks. Actually, it was it was Bynum’s coin. It was on the edge of anybody’s listening. If you follow crypto, you’ll know that it’s just went monumental. So I got finance coin when it was thirty dollars and I sold it at three hundred, so I was pretty happy with that. But the key is this is another thing about crypto that I just know when you’re going to get it because that sort of growth is never sustainable. There’s even another one called Cordano or other. And bear in mind, this is one of the biggest cryptos and it’s done close to like a 15 X or even in the space of a few months. And I think it was a 50 X since the start of last year, which is just insane. Unfortunately, I didn’t have that because I didn’t think it was going to go up in price. But it just shows I don’t always have the answers.

[00:56:47] You know what? It it’s always a guessing game. It’s about dentistry.

[00:56:52] Yeah. What kind of dentistry are you, general? Dentists, obviously.

[00:56:57] Yeah. So I am a general dentist. I, I like everything about dentistry, but I hit root canals with a passion. I just hate them so much. I just really, really struggle with them. I’m OK. I’m average at them. I wouldn’t have bothered them to mix practice. So the proximity the minute is private. There is. I’ve been doing a little bit of NHS work just to see their contract on, but they had I think they had a contract for about two thousand Udai. So it really it wasn’t big and there was that was between me and about four other people. So yeah, it’s mainly private, mainly private.

[00:57:38] What kind of work do you do? You do this line. I don’t do one liners. You have never know.

[00:57:45] I’ve always thought to myself, I don’t know enough about ortho to kind of take the plunge, although I did read. Have you read that book, Introduction to Orthodontist Orthodontics by the Yorkshire guys named Simon, something I read that a really good book actually of No one. If anyone doesn’t know the first thing about, although I read that and it gave me enough knowledge to know that I don’t know what I’m doing, OK, so I would be prepared to have a clearer liner’s case. I’d be happy to do that. I made the right patient and I need it to be something really simple so that I can gain a little bit of experience doing it. And we have a guy in our practice and he’s he’s just single handedly taken the practice to Invisalign. Diamond, I think is it is at the top one single handedly. OK, so so needless to say, he gets all the clear eyeliners referrals.

[00:58:45] Sounds like you need to go on. Perhaps. I guess it’s not a sales pitch. It actually is a ball of wax lyrical now. Very well. We’re talking about invested and invested in your career and. No, no, no. I’m quite passionate about the fact that a lot of dentists are scared about. So because it’s no. Like investing. Right. And if I give anyone some. I asked advice about learning also guarantied Crash’s Abebe course and just learn the basics of alignment, Bletch and Bond. But more importantly, one of the key things they talk about, which is something you’ve just touched on now, is case selection is so important. And we interviewed an infant that is still today. And that was one of the things he was talking about as well. That was that was key, right. Is choose your cases to know where your comfort zones are, know what you should be for and what you should do. This is it.

[00:59:44] I just think I’m waiting for that right. Patient and yeah, I’m sure that they will come. I mean, and I like to learn I like to kind of push myself outside the comfort zone. Can I just say one thing about payments in line while we’re on the show?

[00:59:59] And I promise, as I said this, I said this off camera before the show, but I just could enlighten.

[01:00:07] Enlighten. You actually won’t believe your eyes until you see it with your own eyes. I watched those teeth go. I didn’t think it was possible. OK, so on the payment, hats off to the guy is hand on heart is going to sound like you’ve paid me to say this, but I think that you should go. Why? It’s called payment.

[01:00:25] The money. The money. Yeah. I’m going to come to you for advice on honesty.

[01:00:31] Honestly, it really is. It really is something special. And I didn’t believe it until I saw it with my own eyes. They’ve reduced whitening to science.

[01:00:38] And anyway, I’m going to shut up now because I agree with you. It’s an amazing product. But the toothpaste is even better. It’s yeah. Anyway, I’m going to stop this because it’s a non promotional podcast. Otherwise I could watch the recall about and James just say it’s been it’s been great spoken with you. We’re learning from you about investing. If people want further advice or further information they’ve heard of you, why can they look you up? Where can they find your podcast and start getting into this journey of figuring things out?

[01:01:18] So originally, this whole journey started from a Facebook group that I mentioned earlier, the one that I mentioned earlier, which started about six months ago, and that Facebook is called Facebook group is called tend to invest in a community group for dentists who enjoy trading. So the idea of it is that it can be a safe space. The dentist can talk about all things finance, whatever aspect that might be, whether you’re into stocks, whether in crypto, whether it’s even while there’s a lot of content on there that just focuses on running a dental practice, how you can make that more efficient, et cetera, et cetera. It’s all aspects of finance within dentistry as well as that. It’s mainly UK based, which no one has ever actually quite done before. So a lot of the content focuses on people from the UK and specifically, there’s no reason why anybody who is not necessarily from the UK can’t come on there as well. But all I’m saying is that if you’re from the UK, it might resonate and be a lot more interesting to you, because if I’d tailored the content is, as I say, I think what a lot of us dentistry and I’ve been there before when someone who is a financial guru starts talking to me, I almost have my back up a little bit at the start because I know that their interest may not be aligned with mine.

[01:02:36] So providing somewhere that dentist can have this discussion for no other reason than everybody benefits and learns, that is what makes it unique. And if anything, I’m just surprised that we didn’t have something like that in UK dentistry before, because it just seems it just seems obvious and so necessary to me. And I’m going to realise that now three point three, which is crazy. And honestly, I just I actually hung on hard not to get sentimental. I actually blessed that people have decided to come along and use this group in this way. And it’s become so many more other things than I ever thought it would have been at the start. I really didn’t put any more thought into it other than why don’t we have a group where we can talk about finance a little bit and now it’s just evolved.

[01:03:23] And it does seem obvious, isn’t it? I mean, it’s weird that there wasn’t one really.

[01:03:28] Yeah, honestly. So strange. Really strange.

[01:03:31] I’m to start because then I just want to talk about politics and religion.

[01:03:38] Yeah. I think you get what you get. A lot of members are not. I’m trying to ponder me and Domenico who I don’t, I don’t know Dominic but is a good. Well OK.

[01:03:51] Fair enough. Fair enough. And the other thing I was going to say as well. Yeah there is, there is a podcast too and that was born out of the group. And what I’m very careful to do is, is to present information from people that I know that are good and know what they’re talking about versus all the the static or the. Background noise of people who are perhaps involved in finance, but maybe not as good or maybe not that knowledgeable, and it’s a created safe space for dentists who are interested in finance.

[01:04:26] That podcast is called Dentists to Invest as well.

[01:04:28] Yes, you’re quite right. Yet dentists who invest available on Apple, Spotify were also on Buzz. If you Google Dentsu invest, you can find it as well. Posted by myself with various people from finance who are dentists, but also not dentists. And we actually have an interest in coming up called Plan Your Way to Financial Freedom for Dentists, which starts as of yesterday, actually. And we’re making content which focuses on dentists themselves or from dentists themselves who have achieved a degree of financial freedom outside of dentistry.

[01:05:00] And also there are people who are businessmen, etc, etc. just explaining some of the things that they’ve learned through time and a lot of them to be so successful. So it resonates specifically with dentists.

[01:05:13] You know, the podcast, I’ve yeah, I’ve listened to a few episodes, there was a chapel and there was a young guy, he was twenty eight and he’s starting his own tech firm. What was his name? Alex. Was it Alex? It wasn’t that long. It was only about four or five episodes ago.

[01:05:32] Alex. Yeah, I might have I might be totally wrong with the name. I might have sent you on a bit of a wild goose chase, but I definitely remember the guy.

[01:05:43] And well, our podcast always ends with the same question as before.

[01:05:48] Before that question because because it’s been about finance and heavily crypto thing. It just for a bit of fun, James, and no financial advice. But imagine you had a hundred grand. To invest in Krit, so give me the portfolio spread that you’ve got now for the upcoming bull market.

[01:06:13] What would you say to me personally, like a little bit of risk and I’m more into trading it? OK, so I actually really had an interest and I’ve had a few interesting people approached me from the group who without giving too much away, they’re involved in the financial sector and trading crypto professionally.

[01:06:36] And because of that, I’m privy to a few telegrammed groups that they they keep people up to date with what they believe will happen next. And because of that, I’m able to align my trades with those people. Now, if we look at the patterns of where crypto is at the moment, traditionally what happens is Bitcoin rallies and Bitcoin is harder to rally. Bitcoin is not cooling off a little bit. What tends to happen is Ethereum follows and the coins follow after that. Now, yes, we have seen a lot of old coins value over the last few months.

[01:07:07] I still think they’ve got a lot more head space to go. There’s usually two rallies to massive Bitcoin rallies in each kind of bull run. We’ve just seen the end of the first one. In my opinion, Ethereum should follow. If everything goes to script, Ethereum will follow and then the old coins will follow after that. So my portfolio looks a little bit something like this. I think I’ve got twenty five percent Ethereum. I can actually get it right now. I’ll call you some of the good ones out. Let me just see here.

[01:07:36] So one which is a real short term trade and I only want people to get into it if they’re prepared to get it over the next few months because it’s not a crypto that I particularly trust in the long run is called Tron. Tron Network. Look a little bit into that. A lot of other projects which are trying to do smart contracts or rallying a lot. That’s why we’re seeing at the pump a lot. Trone is trying to do something similar. They also basically have a PR hype man who runs the whole project, and he is someone who loves to hype his project. He knows how millennials work it. It fits a narrative does that. It fits a narrative. And also, as an aside, I was looking at the chart not that long ago and I could see that something fishy was on the chart, that it had this massive volume Kandal. And usually that suggests that someone is modeling it with a little bit.

[01:08:27] So that is my top tip.

[01:08:29] Again, just to emphasize what I’ve said, no financial advice. That is one that I’m following closely. I’ve got quite a fair bit of money on that one myself. Other projects that I like. Let me just see. I’ve sold most of my my finance coin. So if anybody still in that, it might be a good time to get on, because I think that it’s hit the peak of its market cycle personally, maybe keep a little bit in and just see how it goes. A few of my other favorite ones. I like Dot. I like what they’re trying to do. I like fat, fat, I can bridge company. There is another one called Corti, which is a payment program that is aligned well. They use their used by World of Warcraft.

[01:09:11] I can see that getting much bigger after that.

[01:09:14] There is a lot of the rest of the more on this tier. Those are my favorites.

[01:09:18] So I think that if you want some good tips, I know the one Archdale throw in there and can you kind of network again if you’re going to very much go into them with the idea that they’re going to be a punt and be prepared to sell up when it comes to the end of the bull market? I reckon we’ve probably got about six, seven months bull market left.

[01:09:38] So we’ll check back in six months time and see how many dentists they should have, because I know they’re very scared that I might have to rely on my absconding already to the Caymans.

[01:09:51] I should get to work on that strictly strictly not financial advice. Take risks, guys. Totally. I think the final question for you, I think the most interesting one is to imagine you’ve got thirty days to live and you know, you’ve got thirty days to live. What would you do without thirty days?

[01:10:10] Oh, man, that is a great you ask this at the end of every podcast. Some I like it. I really like it.

[01:10:16] Thirty days left to live, you know.

[01:10:20] Root canals.

[01:10:23] Yes. How did you know I was going to say that.

[01:10:25] I think, I think the very first thing I’d have to do is I’d probably go and get a really good sun rose because I haven’t had one in ages. And then I would do my very best to just go out somewhere in the world. I really want to go to Japan. I really, really always wanted to go to Japan. I spent every penny I have. I’m just going out there.

[01:10:45] I travel is a short answer. I travel, how often do you get an answer? That is probably a really boring answer.

[01:10:51] Now, that’s kind of a common one where you travel and who is that sort of thing? You said the other one is travel.

[01:11:00] All right. Maybe. All right. Let’s do it to young man. It said a final down the planet. You’re surrounded by people who are closest to you, your loved ones, nearest and dearest. And you’ve got to leave them with three pieces of advice, stroke, wisdom.

[01:11:24] Good question.

[01:11:25] So I would say throw my positivity into the world because the positivity makes its way back to you. And that is something that I’ve this whole journey like six months ago. I those words resonate with me so much more after that, because I’ve seen how that can work first hand and that selflessly helping people, even if you go into it with you don’t want anything back. And I never do. It does make its way back to you. OK, that is huge. Yeah. I would say work hard, work as hard as you can. Just see each day as a gift, see each day as an opportunity to grow and do your best to push yourself outside your comfort zone. And I would say stay true to yourself. Stay true to your goals.

[01:12:14] Was that too sentimental? You know what, that was me. That was me speaking from the heart right there. That’s what it should be, man.

[01:12:20] Yeah, it could be. James, thank you so much for your time today. Imparting some wisdom on us and dentists. If you’re into investing or want to learn more, check James’s podcast out, join his group and find a safe space to learn to ask your questions. Thanks a lot.

[01:12:38] Absolute pleasure, guys. Thank you so much for having me. It’s been a lot of fun. Take care. Cheers, guys. Thank you.

[01:12:47] This is Dental Leaders, the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging leaders on the street.

[01:12:58] Your house payment, then Groody and perhaps Celenk. 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 if you did get some value out of it.

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[00:00:00] And I remember laughter during the trial, me and my dad and my brother were sitting in my last year and we couldn’t let it get a happier than what we do don’t want to do anything to they want to do medicine or want to do dentistry. And I still remember that day I called my mom while I was there and I said, Mom, we don’t know what to do. And it’s your mom that is wanted by one sort be engineer and part of it. But the rest is up to you. It’s up to you. You know what?

[00:00:33] No pressure.

[00:00:38] This is Dental Leaders, the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging Leaders Dental Street. Your heist’s Payman Langroudi and Prav Solanki

[00:00:56] Is my absolute pleasure to welcome Sandeep Kumar onto the Dental Leaders podcast. Sandeep’s the guy I’ve known for a long time. And if you look at his empire that he’s built up now, you can see that he’s definitely got the bug for scaling businesses. But this podcast is all about, you know, your origin story. What drives you. Welcome to the show.

[00:01:20] Thanks. Thanks. Pleasure to be here. And good to see you. Prav after a long time.

[00:01:24] Likewise, Sandeep. Likewise. Do you mind just taking us back to your origin, your roots, where you grew up, and then moving on to how dentistry featured in your life? At what point?

[00:01:37] Just to cover that, you’re asking my 23 as in like and like to summarise in two minutes, but I’ll do my best. But you don’t

[00:01:44] Look a day older than 24 Sandeep.

[00:01:48] Well, that’s good to know. But I was born in India, in Punjab, in this small town, small family. I have one older brother and my mom and dad, both the teacher in the school, even though we are a small family. But I’ve been brought up in a big family, you know, cultures in India, how their uncles and aunties. So my dad had four brothers, so it was like a gated entrance. And behind there there was a four families, four uncles and then grandma and lots of cousins. So, yeah, it was it was not a lot of fun living living together.

[00:02:31] And then what was schooling like,

[00:02:33] Our schooling is a very, very strange and it’s a very deep cost, but I’ll try and get you there and tell you where it all started. So I did my up to year 10 in in the town where I was born. And I think my dad was a teacher and my mom was a teacher. And they could see that the signs are not looking very good. This guy is not good at studies. God knows what we’re going to do with him. And so, my God, that very he was very well connected. He was very social, so he started speaking to people and stuff. So a couple of years before my brother went to do engineering in Maharastra, they have me remember. So my dad used to go and drop Payman lot of stuff and all that. So somehow he found that out and master that stuff. In those days, there was lots of Dental private schools are opening a lot of stuff, not only in Lancaster. So my dad figured it out that if you do, you’re 11 and 12 and you can get into a Dental school or engineering school in a private school without paying any donation. So one day he went to see my brother and he came back and I was 14 years old at that time. And he sat me down with my with my mom and he said, I’ve got something to discuss with you. And he said, how do you feel that if you have to go where your brother is doing it? And that was like thirty six hours plane Germany. And I said, what options do you do? I said, you know, you can do this, the band BSE or whatever, but if you want to go in dentistry or medicine or law, then that that’s the only option you have. So here I go. You’re not at the age of 14. Pack my bags in the train. Thirty six hours billion with my dad. And he dropped me last. But luckily, my brother was there, so I did my year level in year 12 of that time.

[00:04:30] So I bet that made you very independent, very young,

[00:04:34] You know, looking back, you always find strength from from, you know, where you have come from and and leaving home at such a young age was not easy, but it did work

[00:04:46] Well. As a 14 year old, what was your day to day? As you know, that’s completely foreign to me. You know, it would be looking after you. Who’d be cooking for you? Where where would you be living? What was the secret that led Sunday?

[00:05:00] Yes, the script was my brother was as I said, he was doing engineering in Maharashtra in that time. And he was as if he was living at somebody’s house as a paying guest and they had an extra room. So I went and lived with them and I was a paying guest. So they were cooking for us and we were paying them a pandemic. But that’s how it was. That’s how it all started.

[00:05:24] And then from there on to Dental school.

[00:05:27] Yes, so I did my year 11 and 12 and I did both maths and biology, so if you want to go in medical field, you do biology. If you take you take maths by I took both of those days, you could take both. And I remember after doing 12. Me and my dad and my brother were sitting in my raza and we couldn’t really get it on. But we do not want to do anything. They want to do medicine or want to do dentistry. And I still remember that day I called my mom while I was there and I said, Mom, we don’t know what to do. And mother was wanted by one sort of engineer and part of it. But the rest is up to you. It’s up to you. You know what?

[00:06:15] No pressure

[00:06:16] Or something. You know, I never, never enjoyed medicine. Dentistry is not a bad idea. And that was really never preplanned. I think the only thing I can say is what persuaded me towards that was when I was really young, I had a massive accident and I broke a couple of my front pages and I had to visit the dentist quite a few times with my dad and the way he looked after me and, you know, put some sort of teeth in it so I could live my day to day life. I think that was back of my mind and that was the turning point for me. So I decided to go into dentistry.

[00:06:56] What’s the education like?

[00:06:58] Education, so that was a that was a private school, so first couple of years, we had a lot of the anatomy and physiology and yuzo usable stuff. And then I think the the the syllabus was pretty, pretty similar to what you do here, but not probably in as much depth. And then in the final year, we had a lot of clinical work. And, you know, you can imagine in rural areas in India, the demand for Dental, Solanki is very high. So there was a queues outside the clinical sessions. So, yeah.

[00:07:37] So did you get a lot of hands on experience as a Dental student right from the early days? Were you getting through a lot of volume and and building up those clinical skills?

[00:07:49] But let’s be honest, but if people want to do it, then there was plenty of work to do. But I wasn’t in one of those. I was lucky to get away from it as soon as I could. Yes, I did. Had enough. But yeah.

[00:08:05] What type of student were you? The sort that tries to get away with the least possible work your way through and just just Skyview way through. Get your qualification and move on to the next step

[00:08:15] And you have to nail on the head. Explain to me exactly the people who are close to me. It was like, how can I get away with minimum possible that that’s how it was. And, you know, my my dad always used to come home twice a year during my during my dentistry days. And, you know, living in Maharastra so far away, my expenses were pretty quite a bit and all the time I used to come home and I used to ask Dad, Hey, Dad, I did some more money. And he will say, you know, I give you so much last time all that go on. And by the time I explain to people that maybe Dad’s right, it never, never let me deprive from anything. It gave me an opportunity to say me one thing before I go back to my uni son. Never come home with you know, it’s very hard earned money just about managing that. What we are doing is half of our salary is going into your education to whatever you need to do, but do not come out of the field. And you know, that always, always stuck with me. So I studied enough so I can just possibly

[00:09:28] Just suck it right to the edge. Actually didn’t quite fail, right?

[00:09:31] Yeah, that’s

[00:09:33] What she did. You come to the UK Sunday,

[00:09:35] So I came to the UK in nineteen ninety eight.

[00:09:41] So what was the story as far as dentistry.

[00:09:44] Yeah. So you know when I finished my Bettina’s OK, this is what it was about. You know, I never said how I got into dentistry in that school. There was a 50 students, there was a twenty five of them were local who was born in Maharashtra who live in a lot of stuff, like literally half an hour away. And twenty four of them came from Punjab, who came from a wealthy family who had money, the son of doctors and gynaecologists and all that sort of money. And there was a me ventrilo. So now I have to manage my lifestyle working with these guys who come from a very, very large family. So I managed to get through dentistry, found my money wherever I could from that time, and came back to Punjab after doing my videos. And I came back to my town. And now I have seen the life of Mumbai and life of big city, and there’s no way I’m going to settle down in my time. So that that is that what you want to do now? You’ve just finished exams, now the next step. So there was the college open in my time, not too far away from my town. And I went there as a teacher. So I started teaching one of the Dental subjects. And I think it was a couple of months after I have this thing in my head, I said, this is not for me. And I literally decided to give up their job and I went to China. I’m sure you guys must have heard about it.

[00:11:12] So my brother used to live there and I told my dad, like, there’s no way I can settle in the city. Can I go and try and do MBA? Sounds like a postgraduation and knowing I was not very good at education, that was another challenge on the song. But I left that job, went and studied for the whole year, like literally every day. That’s what I did. No work at all. And guess what? After one year I sent about nine exams for different states, different countries, and I failed all of them miserably. I know in me. And I could get an envious. Came back to town and came back to town again. Their dad was and that’s about it not look. And I said, you know what? The job which I chucked away, that I left and I went to. Let’s go to that college and get me that job. And I’ll because I’ll live happily ever after. So we went back to college and there was a principal, the guy who gave me that job. And as soon as he saw me and he said, you know what, buddy? You chuck that job on me and I, I have not forgotten that nobody’s ever done that to me. I am not giving you this job. And that was the only Dental college I had in town. So the situation was, you know, kinda envious clinic because I don’t have enough money to college, which was nearby, was not willing to have me back as a teacher. Where did you go? And honest to God, that was like the time that I was very, very lost, didn’t know what to do.

[00:12:47] But, you know, Dad was very supportive. Mom was very supportive. But Dad will always ask me so, you know, you can’t live your life just walking around and sitting in this shop and sitting in that store. What do you want to do with it? And I was just getting in that not not depression, but a stage where I don’t know what to. But, you know, that would be bad, and he has said to you earlier, he was very social and he had his own connexions. So he was speaking to his friends and this and that, and then he said, if nothing else, why don’t you go and get married? And I said that let me just build something, you know, have got nothing at all. And then through one of his friend, he introduced me to this girl. And that girl now is my wife, and later that time was Dad’s friend’s daughter and visiting India. That time she had no plans. I had no plans leaving India. We met once and there was there were some issues on my Punjabi family that was from originally from Punjab amongst us from Punjab. We met once and then thought nothing of it. And then we met a couple of times again. And it was, you know, yeah, there is something in there. And that’s what that’s how it went, really. So we decided to get married and a couple of months after that, I mean, you can.

[00:14:07] Sundeep, how many days did you go on before you agreed to get married or you decided to get married? But that, I

[00:14:14] Think was around two months.

[00:14:15] Three months. Yeah. And then so you started your new life together in the UK? Yeah. What happened, what was the. I remember having a really I think it was a jaw dropping conversation really with you and you can fill us in on the Sunday book. There was conversations I had about your role in the Dental practise and what you were doing, not as a Dental practitioner. And we had that conversation. I think it was in your practise when it was booming and it was jaw dropping from where you came from to where you were then and where you are now. So I won’t spoil it. Tell us a story.

[00:14:56] Well, first of all, Prav well done. Don’t you even remember that?

[00:15:01] How could I forget? How could I forget?

[00:15:04] Yeah. You know, it’s it’s landed in the U.K. The biggest thing was I could not speak English. Turned up. As I said, it was not like you had been planning for six months before or trying to find out what the dentistry systems are going to be in that country. It just happened to be the very word of English. But you know what? I will have to get a lot a lot of credit to my amazing wife. She was like a rock, and she still is. She supported me like, you know, it’s OK, it’ll take time. You’ll get there. I could not even pick up a phone and call a Dental Prav is to find out, you know, how the system works. And I couldn’t pick up the phone and call GDC to find out to work. What do I need to do? So the pull of those days, you had to go to work and then I will get a chance. We’ll call the disease and hospitals and this and that to try and find out, you know, what do I have to do to, you know, start working as a dentist here? So we tried that for about a couple of months and I was not getting any of it. And I thought, you know what? I had enough.

[00:16:08] There’s no way I’m going to sit around a bloody hole and keep calling ten practises. And I couldn’t speak a word of English. They couldn’t understand what the fuck I was talking about. And I came home one day and I said, Do you know what? I’m going to get a job. I don’t give a shit. What shall I get? So I’ll go to the job centre near where we used to go to the job centre. And there was a job available in a factory and in the factory, they used to print like a cardboard boxes, they used to print labels on them. I applied for I got the job. And two months after I came to you, OK, that was my that was my first job. So then they said they will be about three pound twenty an hour at that time. I said, just give me whatever money I just need to get out of the house and do something. So I started that and I did that for about six months or so. But, you know, I was so happy I was meeting people, couldn’t really speak to them or communicate much, but I had somewhere to go. I get up in the morning, shower, dress up somewhere to go, and that carried on for a bit.

[00:17:14] And after a couple of months, I remember one day my wife went to see her GP just for a normal, normal routine, Check-Up or whatever, and she told him that, you know, I got married and he was a family doctor. He knew everybody very well. So he just asked us about your husband, too. And she said he’s a dentist from India, but obviously he can’t get a job at the moment. And he said what he asked us, what he is doing now is that he’s working in a factory nearby. And he got so angry on my wife. Why didn’t you tell me? You know, I’ve got Connexions. I could have done this come that for you. So he gave her this business card and he said, go home and call this a symptom of the look out for you. So if I came home, we sat down and she said, you know, that’s what Dr. Venugopal. That was his name. And Dr. Vinegar gave me a card, which my wife called. And that guy was the guy who was a dentist. And he is still very good friend and is still my mentor. And we still stay connected. So I called him and, you know, obviously and she just told you that you asked me to give you a call.

[00:18:23] That’s the situation. Can you have. So he gave my wife somebody else’s number and he said, call this guy and will have. And that guy’s name was Sam. And my wife called them and we then turned up at the practise, went to see him and he said, Are you OK? OK, yeah, that’s fine. So he just explained to me everything he said. This is very common. Lots of people come from abroad and only processes you have to do and you get to do that. Yeah, I said, yeah, that’s fine. And so I said, when can I start? Actually, my wife was talking on behalf of me and start whenever you want and he said, yeah, come tomorrow. And honest to God, guys, you know, I can still looking back that day, that was the happiest moment since I landed in UK just because I was in a an apartment, which I know I know dentistry. I know the smell of the drill and the materials. So I don’t have to go to that factory and print that stuff there. So that was it. And I started working as a as a Dental said that practise and some other some people unfortunately passed away a few years ago. He was the legend. And my feeling was that.

[00:19:40] So then what, you were studying exams as well.

[00:19:44] So from then on, this is what happened. So I used to work as they used to go there as a work, as a Dental from nine to five thirty six. But there was a guy, there was a dentist and who came through the same group as I did. So he came from Pakistan, he worked as a dental nurse and he qualified as a dentist. And that gave me a light at the end of the tunnel. Now I can follow his footsteps and if I do the same thing, then one day I’ll be dentist as well. So. So this is my routine. Like, literally every day was mine to catch a bus, come to city centre Dental Hospital Library used to be up until eleven o’clock. So from six o’clock, eleven o’clock I sit in the library because I couldn’t afford books that time. Library used to close at eleven. I was the last one there always to pick me up every time, so took time to go home.

[00:20:37] And I saw Birmingham.

[00:20:38] Yeah, yeah. All in Birmingham, Birmingham, Dental Hospital. So we had to come back home and go to bed and stuff the same, same to again. So there was those days called statutory exams and nowadays it’s called a lorry or something. After that it takes to like an old lady. So MIT is used to be called the exam. So I passed my first century exam and guys hospital after about a year and I was getting more and more excited. It’s just one step away from the dream. And then I carried on the same. I carried on my nursing. I carried on my studying in the library on the way. For the second part, you have to do a lot of practical work. So I was collecting those expected, mounting them in the plaster of Paris. And then after the clinic was closed, I have some balls and just starting to do the cavities. And that’s what I did that I think it took me about six months or so. And then somebody told me that if you really want to pass this exam, you have to give up this job about at least a couple of months and focus on the central studies. That’s what I did. I spoke to that guy some time and I said, you know what, I’m going to have to stop now because my exams are still months away and I’m going to go and take that exam.

[00:21:53] So I went off event and I took that exam and unfortunately, I failed. The part that was that was tough. That was the that was the lowest of life. Sometimes it can take, given the game myself. And to see someone said this is a situation I failed, unfortunately. And he said, yeah, don’t worry, man. Come on, let’s get back to this thing tomorrow. And that’s what I did, you know, with my pride, with everything. And that started the process again. And then it was, OK, this is what what happened that time. There was statutory time. He was only allowed to take twice. If you failed seven time, that is it. You’re not allowed to do. And just plain you. OK, well what pressure chase about pressure. Yeah. You know, came home and spoke to my wife, discussed about what shall we do. She said it’s entirely up to you. There’s no pressure on me. She was working, she was earning enough to support both of us that time. And then in the year 2000, my wife was pregnant and she was successful. And I said, I cannot wait for another year or two years for my exam. I’m just going to go for it and see what happens. So I applied for the part and the part of that time was in Manchester. And I knew this is the only the only time to have if I fail, that’s a Dental those things for life.

[00:23:20] And that was a calculated decision I had to make. Part of the process was you do it on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and you examined Thursday and your result was on Friday. Compared to what they did was exam was on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and your results was on Thursday. So I knew this is my only attempt I’ve got left. I knew my wife is pregnant and I knew this is this is this is it. So I did not tell anybody and my wife did not know that this time my result is going to be on Thursday. So on Monday morning, I went to Manchester, did my three exams first and only took a train from Manchester, came to Birmingham. I that is the day I started. No, nobody in this world knew that my result is coming today. So I came back to the Langroudi came in a taxi well, somewhere where I had a bit of a pop and I took that. But I made a brave go to GDC. And after a couple of minutes of going around in circles, you know, you did well in this. You did well in that, but you didn’t good in this and you didn’t get in that. And I and then this lady said, you passed your exams, resolutions, talking to you. That is back

[00:24:38] The most have been the second happiest moment of your life and coming to the UK, right?

[00:24:43] Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Yep. And then, you know, that just took a taxi and went straight to me and my wife was working on that day.

[00:24:56] Did you have a plan? Do you have a plan in case you failed? What were you going to do?

[00:25:00] Filled with hundreds of things I have planned, and I honestly do not want to tell on this platform, but could I have those things from anything to anything to anything? God knows what I would have done on that day. I don’t know if. So then I got my mother took a taxi and a little event took place, I was working at that time and I literally went and that’s what she was know. Like I said, we’re doing my best to make all the good luck and everything on Thursday morning, expecting that I’ve got another exam today and. Yeah, that. There you go. And then we left from there and came home. And, you know, what I learnt during these two years is a really spend time understanding the ins and outs of dentistry, even though it was tough for me to sit on the other side of the Dental. And this little boy, I was speaking to the dentist, trying to really understand how this works, how this works. How can you do this? How can you do that? How do you do this? How do you do that? And, you know, that happened in 2000. And we get the guy who I met first time he gave me a job as a assistant. So you have to work as an assistant after that year. And he was a great mentor, great teacher, taught me everything, which I didn’t learn before. He was just such a smooth operator, you know, mother. And I was like, yeah, and I’m doing it. I thought a very fine but cannot come up with a way to go. But he taught me all that and it was it was good. And that was it. That’s how the dentistry started.

[00:26:46] And so from there, when did it practise ownership or business ownership featured in that journey

[00:26:55] That you did you buy your first practise?

[00:26:58] So I qualified in 2000. Then I had to work one year in the system. So that brought me to two thousand. One time my mentor, my principal and I decided to move from where he was to a new new premises. So in 2002, we moved from his old premises to the new premises, and during that time he started a private practise in Birmingham and he was spending a lot of time there. And I was literally working six days a week in December just like this. And then as he was focussing more and more, building his his private practise is just, you know, there was a conversation one day. What do you think? If I buy this and we had a couple of discussions and he said, yeah, why not? But he said, why not? No, but none of the bloody banks are ready to give me a loan. I think you know what? You’ve already passed two years ago, Yanofsky, for a couple of hundred grand. How are you going to pay you to just finish your Dental system? And I remember that time there was a guy called Roger Upton. He used to run these courses called Setting Up Your Own Practise.

[00:28:08] So I turned to one of his calls and I just told him to rise and say, hey, if I introduce myself and say, you know, this is this I am, what should I do? And it happened to be people just like you who, you know, in this world isn’t that’s how it’s done in life, is all about who you know, not what you know, larger than give me this business card. And he said, speak to this guy. And he was a manager at NatWest, called him and he looked at my account and he said, Are you serious that you want to buy this practise is expensive practise from where you are. And I think about it all this these progenies probably gave a good recommendation. And I still remember his word. You know, he said sometime very early and we put the money on the jockey, not on the horse. And he said, I’m going to put money on you. And he gave me every single penny to buy that practise, bought two thousand pound. Well, and that’s it. So, you know, came back, bought the practise in 2003.

[00:29:09] But why didn’t you just associate for like three years? Why what were you in such a hurry? Because because of the time you’d wasted or your entrepreneur. You knew you were that guy.

[00:29:20] I think it’s a good very good question. You know, the reason I can say that, you know, I think I was getting to about 30 years old, you know, not a penny to my name

[00:29:29] Kid on the way.

[00:29:30] You don’t have a wife done enough of supporting me for a couple of years. You never said a bad word. But she’s looking at me and say, you know, look, come on now. And not a house, not a car to fly. You know, sometimes you get to look on your face, look in the mirror and think, you know what, that’s enough. I think I’ve faced enough shit in my life. Let me go out there and really express myself. Without worrying about will I be able to pay those bills, will I be able to pay those loans, let me just go out there. What I’ve got to lose. Let me just go out there and try it and see where I end up and do how did it go? I was I was it so I bought that first practise in 2003. And then we had our second child and we had a daughter in 2004. And at that time, I still remember. I think that’s a very significant event. My daughter was born with living in a very tiny house. And initially then I then I qualified. So obviously I wanted a bigger house. So we bought a bigger house and we got a dental practise. And the loan is like, I’ve never heard of hundreds of thousand.

[00:30:42] How the hell are we going to pay for it? Because I haven’t got a penny. And I sat down with my wife and I said, you know what? We’ve got to think this will buy you this house from here on. Let’s sit down and make an argument. And that argument is you will never, ever stop me going off of. If I say I’m doing 20 hours, I am doing 20 hours, if I turn up at home at 11 o’clock. I won’t go out clubbing and I want to go out dancing. But if it’s work, then please don’t question me because we are taking on a huge responsibility. And us. It’s been a partnership is equally part of I’m responsible for where we are. She played her side of the cards and I did bloody hell. And I did some of those days as well. The 2007 I bought this 2003 about this practise literally every month I was adding a soldier and I was adding a staff and I was adding a dentist. And two and three is up to two thousand six. I call triple the size of that business and then we turn the contract change into Yoda’s. I had a solid and this today’s date is one of the biggest entities practise in Birmingham.

[00:31:55] So how are you how are you adding value to that? And it just blacks back then, could you do it?

[00:32:01] So back then it was a fee for service, like there was no Yoda’s or anything. Like you just do you just do the work. And I was became a workaholic even at that time. So it was literally my principal and my philosophy those days was same and even today is the same. Do not say no to the patient. If somebody turns up in a practise in Payman, my simple instructions to my team was to not say to the patient that we can see you as long as they’re willing to wait. We will see them before the end of the day what time they cannot promise and pay. I still remember before we opened for lunch, there was a 220 people standing outside sometime. And in 2003, I was the only one dentist. In 2006, there were six dentists in the face just to you still learn that practise. So how many? That is my background.

[00:32:54] Is that now? Is that the same six six

[00:32:56] Six six six surgery and it runs beautifully. I still take a lot of pride. I go there every week, I feel home and I go there.

[00:33:07] Ok, so let’s talk about when did you decide to go for number two?

[00:33:12] So number two was 2006, the contract changed to UDS. So from 2000 to 2006, for me it was you know, I never came out one day, but I’m going to do this, this, this and this. It just happened. But 2006 contract, the growth was literally stopped. You can’t go out of business. And I’m sitting there thinking, that’s no, I’m used to what I’m doing. Anybody can come into. And that’s when I started exploding, you know what’s happening outside in the dentistry dentistry board instead of that, my boastful dental practise, let me just go out and explore what’s going on. So I still remember I joined this battle programme that time. I think he used to run some clubs or something. And I speaking to Chris and I said, you know, I’m thinking about to open another practise, but I don’t know what to do. And they have to go. And I still remember he connected me with Zach. And I Kanzaki and Chris was good friends, so I think Chris called, Zacchaeus said, you know, this guy going to you want to have a look at what’s happening in private industry. Can you can you have a quick chat? Cause I went to London one day and I thought, you know, I’m going to go to his practise.

[00:34:28] It’s going to set me in his office and he’s going to tell me a little bit about private practise. That was a compliment. I still remember that day I turned up. He said something. Give me half an hour. Just wait here. Let me just finish what a fun little thing was around lunchtime. And that guy has taken the rest of the day off for me. And he said, let me show you how the private flexes, Bob. So they took me to Dental, where he used to work. It took me to London smiles, took me to blame. And I’m thinking, wow, this is another side of dentistry, you know, which I never, never leave. All I know is. All I know about is about is that it’s so Suzuki spent literally or five hours with me on that day and told me everything introduced with these guys. That’s the first time I met a new and a couple of other guys that time, and that was it. So I came back and I got a bug and I said, you know what? I’m going to need to find a dentist who can do what I do.

[00:35:35] So it wasn’t that first practise is your only NHS one.

[00:35:39] Yeah, it still is. Is it just not we don’t do anything with that.

[00:35:45] Number two, was that small stylist or wasn’t it? Wasn’t it Branden’s that now?

[00:35:50] So in 2007, we started a practise called New Street Dental. It was the central centre of Birmingham. It was one sided like this and again took old ideas from the practises in London to set up a single solitary practise, went on lots and lots of courses, just learnt about smiled Makos and let it all. Some days I’m talking about here sixth, I

[00:36:18] Think I’ve been there that become your my small office.

[00:36:22] That’s been very nice. So that was that was a cyclical factors which I started in in 2007. And then that’s when really these things started to skyrocket. Business was doing well and the businesses started doing well because of Invisalign. That was the first time I introduce Invisalign. So this is how it happened. I opened the practise waiting for the phone to ring, waiting for people to turn, started from zero, started on spot. I had no knowledge about anything. This guy turned up. So somebody called. He wanted to arrange a meeting. So I’m not going to mention his name, but that just came from London. And he wanted to share. He wanted to have a surgery in my clinic and he was happy to pay me about five, six and defence. And I said, what do you want to do? And he said, I want to do Invisalign first time ever. And he said, I’ll bring everything in a suitcase, I’ll come with my nurse. I don’t need anything from you. And I want to do Invisalign. I said, let me have a think about this. Let me get back to you on that. He left those days. I had plenty of time, nothing to do. I just spent on the computer and type work that Invisalign got onto the website. And just looking through the process, there was of course, a couple of next week.

[00:37:39] And oddly enough, the Dental that cause. So let’s give it a go. What’s there to lose? I took a couple of cases with me to show these clinical guys and they said they can be treated, came back, started my starter two or three cases in 2007, still, when they are convinced that this plastic is going to move. But I thought, you know, I don’t have any other patients anymore. So let’s be let’s let’s try and see how this works. And, you know, but then I started seeing those patients and they were coming back and telling us about quitting and they were tracking really well. And I said, you know what? I’m not good at anything else, but let me see if I can be good at this. And just for whatever reason, it just that literally clicked. And in 2008, I end up going and next year literally nearly a hundred cases and just love everything about Invisalign, love everything about the workload blown everything about the happy, the patients. And obviously that was the revenue in the business because everything was worth three, four thousand those days instead of the feelings in the general dentistry. So things started to work really, really well that at that time. And that’s where we started.

[00:38:56] So then what about then when when we met was maybe a year or two after that, when you done the deal with all the House of Fraser’s, how did that come about?

[00:39:08] Yeah, so House of Fraser was literally across the road from the nearest clinic is like one hundred metres of a house, a place that had this. A medical company called Clearwire started doing teeth whitening and like a pool table, teeth whitening centres and all house of places. So one week and they were in Birmingham one week and they were in Manchester, one in Glasgow. So they were in Birmingham one weekend and they did lots and lots of things. But determining whether that time, like you can know, back to the dead, lots and lots of data. I mean, and one of my patients, both her sister and she said, can you have a look what’s wrong with her teeth and her teeth looked like it’s been patched. You know, there was no mama was completely damaged. And I said, what happened? And she said, you know, we’re going to have to pay that. We paid nine pounds and they had teeth whitening. But so the same thing went completely wrong on that one with her. And I treated her as a teacher, her sisters. And we had a very good rapport. And she said, can you fix it? I don’t know if I can fix it, but I’m definitely going to find out a way if I can, so those days I used to do a fair bit of it. We’ve discussed the Dental and all that. So I reached out to those guys on the set and I’ve got a case like this, what to do. So they got me in touch with a couple of people in USA, speak to them, and then they all, you know, they all said to me that we need to bring that back to where it was and slowly the nominee will start to recover.

[00:40:43] But it can take up to six months or 12 months, six, six, six, six, six or 12 months. I have no idea. But I had a bit of idea. Just make the phrase give these jobs and slowly they will recover. So I told the patient, you know, I can fix it, but it’s going to cost you about six grand and it might take about 12 months because I didn’t know what I’m but I’m getting into. And she said, yep, that’s absolutely fine with me. I’ll come back to you. She went to House of Fraser, spoke to herself as a manager and said, give this guy six grand or I am going to slaughter house appraiser anyway. And she was a journalist. And what there. But is that either I put six thousand pound or I’m going to talk about what you have done. And the next thing I know is also business store manager calling me at my clinic and say something. What’s the deal here? And I said, you know, this is what it is and I can give my best. And he said, please, I take full guarantee that I will pay you all the money. Please look after that lady. And that was it. And so I fixed her teeth. Everything went well. And I stayed in touch with the store manager and everything was fine. And then I have a coffee in my shortly before and after this, a bloody hell. He said we need to do something about a little something here with us. And that was it. So in two thousand nine, we opened the first house of Fraser store in Birmingham,

[00:42:07] Which was a beautiful, beautiful place.

[00:42:09] Absolutely. But that’s not a first time, isn’t it?

[00:42:13] What a beautiful thing. You make it sound like it’s all sort of sliding doors, you know, like you bumped into Zachy. And I’m sure there are other points in life where these sort of inflexion points happen. But at the same time, you could have just been an associate in the NHS and you’ve gone and done taking that one surgery place turned into sexology place. You’ve come down. I mean, you know, the next man might have gone and seen poulain in London Smile’s clinic and, you know, just just just started doing some private on the NHS. But you’ve taken these big steps forward, and I’m sure we’ll get to the next ambition. Was that come from that that confidence studio? I wouldn’t like get up. I mean, forget me, but I to get up, go to another country one year after qualifying, go buy a practise there and then it’s a big thing to do by itself. Was the ambition and confidence come from is that from that 14 year old story.

[00:43:19] You know, looking back, I think, you know. I just don’t want to be poor again. I know how that feels like at the age of 30 years old and you can’t fucking afford a McDonald’s for yourself that bloody hard. And you know what I said to you before that when I qualified, I thought it’s time for me to go and play and see where life takes me. And, you know, bullshit. Once I told you about this practise that became the backbone I was not worried about. And you know how I’m going to feed my family, how I’m going to pay my mortgage, I’m going to pay my rent and everything else just became a playground. I was just, you know, bring it on. Bring it on, bring it on. That’s save it then. You know, I didn’t get up one day and say, you know what? And even today, if you ask me something about your dream, I don’t have any dreams. I don’t get up and say I’m going to take over the world and I’m not going to fix it. My dream is I want to enjoy each day and let me see where this takes us. And that’s always been the attitude attitude since then.

[00:44:25] So when did my smile come along Sunday.

[00:44:28] What was the jump in you jumping them and your jumping? Because because that one one practised in the House of Fraser became seven or something, right?

[00:44:37] Yes, that’s right. So I started in the place. Then there was a couple of pandas going on in and adjust just that time in 2009, 2008, 2009 time. And I want to tender’s. So in 2010, I was building three Dental practises at the same time. One man’s house place on the hill and to those tenders, one. So by that time I had a fight and then we opened another one in Manchester in 2012 because we had a system. You know, I still remember people talk about, you know, it takes two years before you make a profit on this and that. I had a formula. I worked out that formula and then Birmingham and in year one month, three months just did a huge open day due to retirement in year one. We did me the hundred plus cases of Invisalign so that a lot of love and have that. So yeah, it was it was the coming to a stage where outside London I was becoming the go to guy for the misalign.

[00:45:50] And what what were you personally doing at this time, were you running around all these clinics as a practitioner? Would you step back from clinical before? What was your role in all of this, the NHS practise you were telling your wife? I’ll see you next week. And I’m working. So.

[00:46:10] So I think, you know, the one thing I’ve done after all this is I so those days are working seven days a week, then down to six, then down to five and down to four. So by this time I think I was working about three days a week and two days a week managing, managing the business. And yes, that that that that’s where that’s where it was. And then a couple of years after, I’m sure we’ll get there. And then I decided to quit dentistry.

[00:46:36] Sometimes some tips for managing multisite practises. You said you said systems, but for me, that must be it must be people

[00:46:47] Must be key leaders. Just only one one thing I run my business based on, and that is it’s all about people. I manage people. People manage the business. It’s as simple as that. I am not good for them. And I know that I can’t put the associate together. Have you ever seen an email from me? More than half a paragraph. I know what I’m good at, but I surround myself with some amazing people who get these things done. And it’s it’s all about people.

[00:47:20] So do you think you’re a good judge when when you meet someone, you’re a good judge of character was

[00:47:25] Fucked it up many times you can imagine. But overall, overall, I think I managed to get it right. I’ve made so many mistakes, made so many wrong judgements, but I don’t beat myself up for it, you know? You know, sometimes you have a bad day. I just to get somebody handed in a notice and they want to leave and somebody made a complaint. I used to get really worked up about those things. Now it’s just part of the business. That’s what business is. And I remember this scene from Richard Branson. I went to one of his life lessons. I would just pick one thing. And I still remember that, you know, when you’re running a multi size, get comfortable being uncomfortable. You know, I honestly don’t get up every day in the morning where everything is smooth sailing. There’s always something going wrong somewhere. But what I do is I backed myself and I back. My family supported me and back the people I have with me that no matter what happens, we’ll find it. And it’s just it’s just that confidence, you know, it’s OK. Things will go wrong. But look.

[00:48:39] When did the digital marketing start sending

[00:48:42] Digital marketing, so I’m sure Prav Prav know much better that better than I do on this subject. You know, when I started on the estate like this. Now, believe me, this note, guys. I can see the bullshit because I know inside out about Edwards, I spent like months and months understanding about this Google AdWords and my first account on the street Dental I set up myself personally and I ran that. And I used to have these, you know, the bits and pieces you want to show, you know, Dental that I used to manage all that about myself. Obviously, you know, things have changed and it’s a lot more algorithm driven and all that. But I had a very, very good, good understanding because, you know, I got to the stage where I started to think, you know, there’s a lots of good then disappear, lots and lots of good dentist. And I employ more than 20 dentists plus across the business. Can somebody do what I’m doing? And this is a way of bringing people in. The clinic is the art and science on its own. And Prav Prav knows that better than anybody else. If clinical dentist is allowed on science, I’ll tell you, man, this bringing these people and setting these systems and patient journeys is an art and science on its own. It’s just about what what you what we do and what you what you like to do, really.

[00:50:14] And so Sunday, what what was it that moving on from there inspired you to sort of create the Invisalign beast that you have to the day? Was there a was there a turning point in what you were doing where you thought, you know what, I can I can take this turnkey operation that I’ve developed, a smile stylist or whatever and apply that elsewhere. And let me see. Did you I’m assuming you didn’t have this huge vision because you just said that you take one day at a time and you just want to enjoy yourself. Right. So how did it all come about?

[00:50:48] Maybe start by telling

[00:50:50] Someone who doesn’t know what my mom is. Yep, I think I’ll finish it what my smile one, let’s start with a journey started from 2014, as I said, a new clinic. I was doing more and more of Invisalign by 2014. So my overall revenue of the business was more fun than everything else. And when I looked at those papers, I said, guys, this just speaking by itself, why don’t we focus on what we got? And that was the time I made a decision that nobody has done that before. Lots of people were talking about it. And I said, you know what, I’m going to turn this into an Invisalign on the clinic because consumer demand at that time and consumer brand awareness was getting to a stage where people were calling and say, hey, can I look at the phone company misalign instead of going to book? And what is frightening and that was the level I spoke to. And I don’t think there was a single person who said to me, that is a good idea, except one. I still remember that. And yeah, I went ahead. I just called it a Invisalign on the clinic. So that started in 2014, obviously in aligning technologies. Eco-System, they must have heard or, you know, some DEPREZ took a plunge and started in the clinic so that somebody from Aline’s head office in Amsterdam that time came to visit and came to see the clinic. And we went out for lunch and we just having a discussion. And those days I was doing like, you know, outside London.

[00:52:18] I think over the last ten years, I’ve been the biggest provider by and by long, long mile. I was doing those days about three or four hundred cases every year. And, you know, we sat down at lunch and he asked me, you know, what do you do differently compared to everybody else? And I still remember I said, yeah, but that’s my mostly what you find is that, you know, there must be something we can do. Right. And this is where this idea of my social network came, that why don’t we create a platform where I can openly share all my years of learning, all my years of understanding this Invisalign business and help people to grow there in this business. And that’s where this idea came from in 2014 and 2015, in April. So I remember from January, you know it now it looks easy. Everybody looks at it in my mind is a big beast now. It is a beast. It is, you know, with nearly 80 prospectuses. Now, what I remember can you imagine going out and telling people about the this never been done before. You’re going to have to pay five grand just to be part of this. And then on top of that, you’re going to have to pay a grand a month and we will try and grow your investment business. So they’re competing for 17 grand. So, you know, I went up and down the country, travel up and down that lots and lots of people.

[00:53:45] Did a line help you with that? That they say, you know, give us some perspective.

[00:53:50] One hundred percent, 100 percent. So whatever I have done, I’m not going to take all the credit for it. And where I am today, it is in collaboration with the line technology from day one. I had to put a business plan together. I have to show them the concept. I have to show them what it could potentially become and how we could support people. So they dedicated somebody alongside and me. We used to travel together. So one day I will be Newcastle, one day in London, one day in Manchester, trying to introduce the concept to these guys. And in April 2015, we had about 12 people who placed their hand up and say, yeah, we will we will start and see. See, that goes no. We started at twenty people at that time and twelve out of those twenty are still part of the most fun network.

[00:54:43] And the, you know, it’s a it’s a beast of a company to work with. There must be loads of others who’ve tried something like that or are trying something like that. You just really get on with that dude from Amsterdam.

[00:54:58] No, not on. Not only in.

[00:55:00] And I guess I guess you know your priority to them as one of their biggest users. Yeah. But still, you know, dealing as a as a as a dentist dealing with this slow machine. Did you did you find it easy working with them or was it too challenging?

[00:55:18] To be honest, the simplest way I can explain to you explain to you this is there’s a one thing about me. I am a very, very people person. I work with Payman. I don’t work in my team. I work with my accountant. I don’t care about company. There’s about 200 accountants. I have one lawyer. If there’s any question, I pick up the phone and talk to him. And same thing with a line, even though, you know, even at that time the line was a big company and now it’s a massive, massive company. It’s all about people. And because I was. Lots of cases that time they felt it was important. So they did whatever they had to do to look after me and I’ve been hand on heart, I’ve been 100 percent loyal. Lots of people have tried and say they’ve come and do this to us. And that’s how it’s it’s been it’s been it’s been about people. And even to this day, I still speak to all the lying team from a territory manager to the senior vice president. And we work together. It’s a collaboration. I can’t do this by myself. And obviously they see the benefit of it. So you asked me, can I explain to people what my smile is? This is a way to look at this like this is a win win win.

[00:56:36] There’s a three stakeholders in this business, there’s a dentist who joined the Misbah and there’s a spot and then there’s a of technology. Until this doctor or the dentist joins us, does the case, I don’t get anything, the line technology don’t get anything. So it’s in our interest to make sure that we send them as many leads as we can. It’s in our interest to make sure we train them really well so they know how to set the patient journey in the clinics and they can come out those. Customers into treatment. It’s in our interest to make sure that we set up the plate checks in the best possible way so they can treat more and more cases confidently. And finally, we help them to become a commercially viable model by giving them extra discounts. So if they are willing, they are happy, allowing technology is getting more and more cases, you know, now we are doing like the record currently a record month after month after month and the start of this year, I think this month we are on target to do so. Nearly 700 cases, one. So the bogus adopters do have beelined technologies. And then I have a commercial relationship that the more they do, the more the better it is for my smile. So it’s it is a win win strategy for everybody with.

[00:58:01] That’s beautiful, man.

[00:58:03] And so having grown the My Smile network to, what is it, 80 around 80 practises

[00:58:11] And the 80 plus nalliah.

[00:58:13] Was the academy all about the only reason I learnt about that is I saw a video of you on Facebook talking about sort of handing over the keys to your success. And then I came across the academy. So is that a is a training and education sort of platform? Is that centred around Invisalign only or general business development? Just tell us a little bit more about this and where that idea came from.

[00:58:41] Yeah, absolutely. It’s a good question. So part of my small network is everybody who joins us, they get the exclusive. And that is if the contract and my guarantee to those guys is as long as they stay in the NFL, I will not have anybody in those territories. Now, we dropped this contract in 2015 and those days, I think a line used to do about five thousand cases a month to nearly a hundred thousand now. But the contract is still the same. So say take an example of knowledge. So not if there’s a guy called somebody. He’s been part of my contract for the last six years under the contract with him that as long as you stay with the network, I won’t have anybody else in your area. And he’s still there. But there’s a lot of other people who are doing Invisalign now who want to join my mom, but they can’t because their territory is locked down. So the whole thing about Academy is I said, why did I started my school network so I can go properly, go out and share my knowledge, my experience and help people to grow their business. So my small academy is purely Invisalign. It’s done in collaboration with them as a nine. It is about teaching people. Why they should focus on this line and what they should do. We won’t be doing anything for them, we won’t be doing the things we want to be doing, the treatment planning. So this we won’t be going into their practises to do their training. But this is an online education programme so that I can share, you know, does it not only mean I think there’s a lots of other people who are doing exceptionally well in the network so we can collect additional knowledge with these guys to help them more.

[01:00:35] So today it’s all online, is it not? It’s not liveable

[01:00:39] At the moment, it’s all online because of the current current status, things may change. And if they do change, you know, we will look at changing those labels and the platform, how we do it. But right now, well, this quarter is starting on 1st of April. We are going online.

[01:00:57] Is it open to my small packages or they already getting all of this?

[01:01:00] So my small practises, you know, it’s it’s all about you. I have a relationship with them. They will get a free access to this because of our relation with them. So everybody else is not part of my spine that they are paying for this. But my network members will get free access to us.

[01:01:19] Was a costed.

[01:01:20] It’s seven thousand pound for three months.

[01:01:24] Or and so is it an on demand platform so so everything is pre-recorded and you can just access it back, or is it like things are released at certain times and live webinars and things like that? What’s the what’s the former.

[01:01:39] So the formula is 12 weeks, like one hour sessions with different industry experts at the back of that, we will have a WhatsApp and a online platform where people can ask us any questions they want and they can reach out to me directly. And we will be preparing them to do them every day at the end of three months so they can feel they can implement all the strategies which they love and as they go along and implement that and do the things and this is this is this is this will be a rolling Kodaly programme moving forward. So the first one is first of April and then into Q3 and Q4. So, yeah.

[01:02:30] We ask everyone this question, Sandy is around clinical errors,

[01:02:39] If you remember which one

[01:02:44] Look, we did another search to cover those errors,

[01:02:52] Errors funny because in medicine we tend to hide them. Whereas if we can learn from each other, can you think of any mistakes you made,

[01:03:02] Your life changing and life changing? I’m going to say with you asked to ask me it. So it was somewhere around in twenty, seventeen, forty six, twenty, sixteen, twenty six to business was crazy busy. My school network was growing phenomenally practice’s was doing well and I was doing clinical dentistry. But I was mainly focussing on two big cases in the news and stuff like that. One Friday, I have this patient walked in and was on the chair of those, they are supposed to fit them and but on the back of my mind, my laptop was open. My phone was there because I was expecting a very important goal. And by four o’clock, I have to transfer some money to my lawyer so we can get that deal done. So the patient is on the chair. I can’t say no because I booked all afternoon on the back. I’m keeping an eye on my phone and my laptop and that email is going to the phone is going to ring. So I started prepping this case and then was just about to put those videos on and the phone rang and my half of the focus was there. The focus is the finish the case. Ask the patient to set up just before I give up Amida. And I want the. Dos Santos about just nowhere near where they’re supposed to be.

[01:04:20] There was a count in the red line and I was absolutely speechless. So what I have done the. And you know what? I was very honest with the patient and I said, you know, something has not gone right. You need this. Let me fix it for you. Your appointment next Saturday. I’ve booked a whole day off. I’ll get my life to redo this business and sincerely apologise. And, you know, with time, I built a good rapport with the lady and she said, you know, it’s not ideal. I am a little bit upset about it, but I completely understand this and that, blah, blah, blah. So she came told us that Saturday we have 10 minutes to give us some discounts, give us some freebies. And that was the time I sat down. I think, you know what that’s enough clinical dentistry for. I am not giving my patient. So they come to me, they put a lot of trust and they pay me a lot of money and they expect a service, and at that time was the crunch time I decided I’ll focus on running the business. And that was it. So since twenty seventeen, I have not picked up a girl. So it’s going into four years. And that was a very tough decision, you know,

[01:05:36] Even Invisalign as well. But not everyone either.

[01:05:39] I don’t do anything for them.

[01:05:42] Welcome. Welcome to you

[01:05:48] Both. Now, both of us,

[01:05:50] Both of us, a failed clinician.

[01:05:53] This was your defining moment, quite similar.

[01:05:59] Yeah. Yeah, it was. But it was. I took these two these two temporary crowns off and both of them had the cause inside them both. There’s a horrible moment

[01:06:14] Right after that.

[01:06:18] So how many employees do you have now? I mean, as we’ve mentioned, all your businesses or is there a couple of Indian takeaways?

[01:06:26] You have a couple of Indian takeaways and a couple of partnerships and this and that.

[01:06:32] But the employees, if you go in.

[01:06:35] I think including everybody, I think we are close to 80,

[01:06:38] All the people that a lot of people,

[01:06:42] But, you know, the business is all about people. We touched on that before. And I’ll be very easy for me to take a pride and do take care of everything. It’s not my it’s not it’s nowhere near that for people.

[01:06:56] And so how much do you enjoy it, Sandy? I mean, like, if I was your friendly corporate who said, you know, Sandy, I’m going to take this off your hands, you know what I mean? Like, if we could value the thing, whatever you want to walk away from. But how much do you love it? I mean, would you do something? What would you do? This is to say I came along, gave you your father, how much you value. This is

[01:07:22] Enough

[01:07:22] Money, enough money to walk away. What would you do next? I mean, is that a plan is a plan. You think five years. What do you think? What do you think?

[01:07:32] Good question. So this is what I can tell everybody right now, I am loving it. You know, considering that I was 20 years ago from today, like every day is a living bonus, I never, ever, ever dreamed in my life that what I’m doing right now. Right now, I love so, you know, people talk about hobbies, but you enjoy it. I love work. You know, you’ll give me a problem for fact. I’m going to go out for a walk and I’m going to mull over it most often. I’ll get an answer. I get on my meditation routine in the morning. And I’ll think over it after that and see if I can find it also, if I don’t, it’s OK, I’ll do that next day. So I find this a very challenging I have got lots of ambitions, but what I’m enjoying is in the process, what I am becoming. And the first thing is, I can barely speak English now.

[01:08:29] I know I’ve noticed with you, too, that since I’ve known you a good 10 years now, your smile just gets bigger and bigger and bigger.

[01:08:37] And we enjoy what you do, man. I think it’s a it’s a it’s tough out there. You got to enjoy what you do for those sun.

[01:08:49] Give us a typical week of how your week pans out day in the life week in the life. What are you doing?

[01:08:58] And day in the life, I am probably the most autopilot person you’ll ever meet, and I really mean. Five days a week, my alarm is set to for 30. I am the bed by nine, nine thirty, get a professional, I was looking at my app this morning, I use this app called Mieux. Two hundred fifty fifty three days of running straight on meditation. Never miss a day. I’d like to grab a cup of coffee after that and just mull over something that is bothering me. What is the big decision I need to make? And I have a really, really, really easy start of the day. My son’s going to uni now, and I told my daughter to come home, go to the gym, spend some time with the wife together, and then she’s working as well. So she’s managing, managing quite a quite a bit of the business. So she goes out a couple of times. And you know what? Every day is dependent. Who needs me there and what needs to be done. I have if I if you ask me what I have owned on freedom of time and I want freedom of choices, I can sit there and decide what my next week need to look like. And I’m there for people, there for my team, then I believe the meeting and I don’t have total responsibility of any of the department. There’s somebody else looking after them. Think that somebody is looking after that, that somebody is looking after the operations. Yes. Ultimately, I have a helicopter view of everything, but I don’t the business does not run because

[01:10:41] You haven’t got any deliverables.

[01:10:44] Looking at me and said, you know, Friday, five o’clock, it is that stuff with is supposed to deliver.

[01:10:52] Have you always woken up at four thirty in the morning since 2013? What happened? It just read a book.

[01:11:06] So I’m thinking about that time of 2013 at the of the work. And I think one day I was just walking out in a very cold, sunny day, cold day minus temperature, and I was sweating like a pig. What the hell is what the hell is going on? And by that time I would drink every night and eat whatever comes in front of me was about thirty six, wasted that time and never really looked after myself. And it was all about business, business, business. So I went to see a doctor and I did all the tests and they said there’s nothing wrong, you’re fine. But I knew deep down that you know what? I pushed and pushed the board bit too far this time to rein it in. And that was it. Since then, to change the lifestyle, I started cycling, started doing gym, started doing little and not eating consciously. I still have you know, we still have a pizza on the weekend and I have a bottle of wine some time. But being conscious of what you watch it on Sunday.

[01:12:06] I speak to a lot of people, a lot of successful individuals who start off life sacrificing healthful career or health, wealth or whatever you want to call it. And then there’s often a turning point in their life where something happens and events or they start thinking about their own mortality. Right. And then health starts featuring this as a priority. Is is that that event for you when you take a

[01:12:37] Million percent health and family is right at the top and everything else is is there but is far below that close to party’s? No compromise on those two things.

[01:12:52] And it is such an inspiration really

[01:12:56] Coming from you, that means a lot.

[01:13:00] So we tend to finish this podcast with the same questions like legacy based questions. We call it Prav. Final questions.

[01:13:12] I mean, I’m just sat here pretty much like I was when when

[01:13:16] I met you in in Birmingham, jaw on the floor, listening to your journey from where you’ve come, where you are today. So still the same person. You know, it’s bloody hell, it’s inspiring you really that that means a lot coming from successful guys. And, you know, you have you both have done phenomenally well. And I’ve got a lot of respect for you guys coming from you that that really means a lot to you.

[01:13:43] And it’s amazing to, you know, when we sit back and you say, right, well, what’s important to you is family and health. Right. And everything else is second best. It’s it’s lovely to hear that. Really, really lovely to hear that. And so moving on from that sun connexion, we’re not all immortal. And that day is going to there’s one thing that’s guaranteed in life, and it’s our last day on this planet. Right. And imagine it was your last day on the planet and you had the important ones around you, your loved ones around you. And you had to leave them with three pieces of wisdom. What would they be?

[01:14:21] Yeah, it’s it’s a very deep question, but it’s you got to really think about this, so this is what of my mind both. I spent a fair bit of my life feeling unnecessary things. Which didn’t really mean a lot. And my first piece of advice would be face your fears. There is a beautiful, amazing life on the other side. And so I think what would be wrong, you’re always. What I do, nobody else is doing. I have no competition. I’m not looking ahead and I’m not looking backward. I’m running my own race. And I think that that is that means a lot when we start to compete and compare and this is where we start cutting corners. This is a bit of a service of both. You know, we are all individuals and do what you what you enjoy doing. And, you know, you have to as you mentioned earlier, that you saw my video recently until December 20, 20, I’ve never done a video. And now I’m doing it like literally every big. And that’s the third message is express yourself. We all got a story to tell. We all maybe one or two people can learn from this, you know, what we’re doing today or what I have done only to inspire one or two people. You know what? If this guy can do it. Let me give a. And, you know, we can change one or two people’s life by doing that. It’s been.

[01:15:56] Racing and Sundeep, how would you like to be remembered so if you were to repeat and complete the following sentence, Sundeep, was that well, how would that read?

[01:16:07] But I will complete that and I’ll come back to that in a second. But here’s the reality. As I said before, I don’t get up in the morning and I’m how I’m going to change the world. I’m going to buy 20 practises. I’m going to do this. None of that. I want to be remembered. Somebody was a great dad, a great husband, a good boss, a good son and a good friend. Beautiful, but that’s about it, you know, it’s not it’s not changing the world, it’s about small, small, small changes and just making sure be kind to yourself, but be kind to the world. Lovely. And Sunday, if you had 30 days today

[01:16:52] And you knew that in 30 days time it was your last day on the planet, what would you do in those 30 days?

[01:17:00] I think what was I’ll probably carry on what I’m doing, probably about 20 percent of what I’m doing, and I will spend a lot of time with my family, with my kids and my wife. And I will make sure that I leave everything in good hands. I’m very, very confident if I’m not here in 30 days, the businesses will carry on. Kids will be look after. I won’t be happy, but I’m sure she will get used to because kids will be there to look after. It’s about leaving the world and my my little place at a better place than being is today. That’s what I’ll focus on the next 30 days, Sunday.

[01:17:48] Thank you so much. It’s Saturday with my jaw on the floor and I’m inspired and in the same respect, so many values that we share that revolve around family and health and that sort of happiness. It’s been such a lovely conversation.

[01:18:06] Thank you so much.

[01:18:07] We thank you. Thanks for having me, guys. Really appreciate that. And there’s nothing else you got to go to catch up with. You guys got to this fast paced world of sit down and talk about for an hour. What we have done these days means a lot.

[01:18:23] The funny thing, you know, did you know each other all these years? And then you realise

[01:18:26] There’s so much you don’t know, so much you don’t know about the lovely times. I think I should ask you for interviews next time on your inbox. I may reach out to you guys

[01:18:39] In three years time. He’s going to have a podcast network

[01:18:48] That makes a lot of money. All right, guys, thank you. Thanks for your time. Really appreciate the

[01:18:54] This is Dental Leaders, the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging Leaders history. Your house, Payman, Langroudi and Prav Solanki.

[01:19:10] 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 got some value out of it if

[01:19:25] You did get some value out of it. Think about subscribing and if you would share this with a friend who you think might get some value out of it, too. Thank you so, so, so much for listening. Thanks.

[01:19:35] And don’t forget our six star rating.

[00:00:00] Stick to your protocol, stick to the way you do stuff, and again, all of these are just learning lessons. You know, when you’re in it, you feel, oh, God, what a helmet, why do I do that? But then you realise actually stick to your protocol, stick to the system, stick to what you do and try not to go out of that too much, because actually that’s when you produce the best clinical dentistry.

[00:00:26] This is Dental Leaders the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging Leaders and dentistry. Your heist’s Payman, Langroudi and Prav Solanki.

[00:00:43] It’s my great pleasure to welcome Sameer Patel onto the podcast. Samir is now principal of one of the highest profile prices in the country, 11 Dental with his wife, Sheibani. But to me, it’s great to have you. This podcast is about trying to get to the person behind the persona, and we tend to sort of start with the same question and the same question. But the first question generally is how did you grow up? What kind of kid were you? How did you get Stenstrom?

[00:01:14] Yesterday, she was not even on the horizon, I’m from a family of doctors and some dentists in there, and it just grew up with a passion for cricket. And everything I did was about being out there, being playing sport. And that’s all I wanted to do. And so that’s what I did. I just remember growing up playing cricket almost every single day and fortunately I was OK at it. So I then got into the county teams and had some great coaches and mentors that then took it to a level where it became quite serious. But growing up, everything was driven just all about cricket. And I remember I was I went to private school as a young boy and then went to Selective Grammar School. And I was struggling academically in this year of one hundred. And I was like between nineteen ninety five. And we had our headmaster meetings and he said and I said, he said, if you’ve got anything to say, I said, I think I’m struggling. And he said, but no one else plays for the first team in cricket, hockey and rugby and captains them. And so I think you’re doing OK. Keep going. And for me, for the first time growing up, that was the first affirmation that I had had because I’d grown up in a household where, you know, Dad would work, mum would be at home.

[00:02:32] And often, you know, I think Indian or all across the board, but we’re just not given many compliments. And I remember also winning a game. I was forty five out. We’d be in this really tough school and again dropped into the car is like, why did you get up? You could have. I mean, I was like, so I grew up with very few affirmations and my sister was really bright and she was academically driven. And so I just think that I was a really happy child, don’t get me wrong. But what I look back there was never that much well done. Well done. There was a lot of love and there was a lot of love because we had a huge family and that was amazing. But I grew up in a very happy household and I was told that it was okay to play cricket and do some stuff. I suppose as I got older, there was a little bit more pressure from parents to do some studying is I think a lot of Indian parents do. But it wasn’t until the age of 15, I think I had a self realisation and I walked into a pharmacy again, Dad had picked me up from school and we were driving back home and he had to go pick up some medicine from from the chemist.

[00:03:38] And the pharmacist sat me down and he was OK as a bloke. So we used to see him a lot because I used to go and pick up the medicines with Dad and he just said, where are you going to end up? And I said, I just want to play cricket. And he said, What happens if that doesn’t happen? And for that, I mean, I don’t know where it came from, but I just knew at some stage I wanted to be successful not in cricket, but have to be able to do stuff that I want to do. And I knew that I had to study. And thankfully, I was in a school that was so academically driven that actually just to turn that on. And when I turned my mindset, I just naturally had affinity to maths, chemistry, biology, and I was being successful. And then again, it felt good to be successful and like anything. And the thing I learnt with my children is they will do what they enjoy. So let them enjoy stuff and let them be good at it and they will then be successful. So I then did my GCSE and did my A-levels. And as I was doing my A-levels, it was then what am I going to do still? And I still want to just play cricket because at this stage I was now playing for Berkshire.

[00:04:40] I was playing the first team at Redding and I still knew I had to do a degree and must do a degree. You got to just go play cricket. So then I was playing, I was playing cricket and biology was the quickest way I could get in and out of university quickly. And then I started doing some. They set us up for work experience and solicitors and dentistry. And actually dentistry was OK. It was it was a complete there was a game for every single patient. You have to win the game every time. It was great feeling, great import, whatever. And just in the side where I did my work experience in early and reading what a great bloke just set me on as a mentor to say you will be great at this, you are great with people. You love all your handi stuff. This is all we do. This is what you should do. And that gave me the impetus to change my whole UCAS form at the age of 17 from biology through to dentistry. And I would say that would be my childhood. In a nutshell.

[00:05:40] It was Jackson who convinced you that dentistry was the right career. You were going into Solicitors’ wherever, doing a bit of work experience here and there. And what was it during that work experience that made you think this is really what I want to do? Was it was it that parallel to the games in cricket that, you know, you’re winning at this, you winning at that? Or what was it about that work experience that made you think what this is what I’m going to focus my UCAS problem?

[00:06:05] You know, probably it was very much the people you were with people the whole time, and it didn’t feel like an office and it felt like it was practical. And, you know, dentists have this sort of feeling when you’re looking at them. They’re always on holiday. They drove nice cars and and it all just seemed about right. But the fact that I was with people and this list of three holidays a year minimum and I was like, oh, that sounds OK as a profession to go into. And in those days you needed BBC or BBC. I definitely won’t get into dentistry now, but I mean, thank goodness, you know, we could get in and then start our undergraduate.

[00:06:47] And so what school were you what sort of student? Where were you? Swati Smart kid. Top of the class somewhere in the middle.

[00:06:54] No, I definitely started. I was OK in primary school and we were all doing our stuff. And then as soon as I hit, I would say a medium to large pond. I became a very small fish and I knew I was a small fish and that was OK because in the sports world I was OK and everything sort of balanced. And I sort of felt I was I was appreciated and I had my place and sport kept me afloat, I would say at that time, because, you know, to be in that sort of percentile the whole time through your school thinking not that clever, not that clever. And then when the headmaster says, you know, what is the point, one percent in the country that go to these type of schools and you just so happen to be in the 90 percent, it’s OK. So I don’t think I was. I just think I had potential, but I just wasn’t interested in exploring that. But then when I did and I found some sort of form and some sort of rhythm in terms of studying, and then you got rewarded for it, it felt pretty good. And therefore, I would say I’m very much driven on target driven and rewards. And I would say that that hasn’t changed to some degree. I love applying for these awards that are there in dentistry and things have now sort to calm down a little bit because Shivani is now a judge within the private industry awards. That’s my life. So I just feel like, you know, achieving something. And now it’s now in the business world. It’s just that I would say I’m a achiever and I like setting myself my own goals. I definitely wasn’t a swoll. I didn’t spend much time studying, but I did enjoy learning at that stage when I then found out it was interesting. And you honed in to maths, chemistry, biology, A-levels, and I say that’s when it changed. I enjoyed learning

[00:08:40] Something. You said, you know, you were talking about Asian parents not giving compliments. And I can relate to that obviously was a different time back then, but you turned out really well from it. So then with your own kids, did you feel the need to be the same or did you feel the pain of that and want to address that? Because I remembered the first time my dad telling me he was proud of me was when I fitted eight veneers on him twenty twenty seven years old or something. But because he’d never said it before, I really felt it. But then as a reaction to that, now I tell my kids I’m proud of them all the time. And my feeling is maybe, maybe I’m overstating it and. Well, how do you handle your kids?

[00:09:28] Yes. And so, look, I have three kids, 11 year old, and my twins are five. And I think the biggest thing I try and do is provide a home with a lot of love because I think life is hard. And that’s the bit I figured out. Life is hard. And actually to come back to a loving environment is so important. And so that just allows your child to then be who they want to be. But when it comes to disciplining, definitely I have discipline and I think that’s part of growing up and understanding rules and pushing boundaries. And I am very much I’m proud of you, but I sometimes do feel a bit like you, I would say, because I knew now I would have perhaps had not got to where I am today if I hadn’t wanted my parents adoration. And so I think there is a fine balance between giving them love and telling them I’m proud of them. And I don’t think I’ve found that, by the way, because I’m a big softy with my three girls. And but I just think there is that line and there’s that line of making them feel their loved, but actually understanding this discipline and wanting them to be the best they can be. And I think that’s what our parents wanted. You know, there was no mollycoddling. We just had to get on with it. We never saw our parents. They never helped us with our homework we just sat at, whereas now it’s so different. We’re so involved in our children’s lives. And is that a good thing or a bad thing? Again, I don’t know. I don’t know

[00:10:58] If it’s it’s funny. When you when you were speaking about your dad, it just reminded me of mine, the accident, everything made Be Gone book. But the interesting thing is, you know, I’ve come home and say I’ve got ninety seven percent in a maths test. And he said, what happened to the three.

[00:11:14] Yeah, I mean, we’ll all about first.

[00:11:21] So I do really resonate there. And I do think that that for me growing up I had a point to prove right. And it was well how do I get that extra three percent, how do I make my dad proud, etc., etc.. And there wasn’t a great deal of confidence back then. But I do think to me it was a driving force. But in answer to your Payman question question, I’m the total opposite. So loads of loads of hugs, loads of well done, proud of you. Compliments, blah, blah, blah. But you do you do kind of sit back and sometimes think, are you overdoing it? Is everything an achievement? You know, it’s hard to know what the right thing to do is, right?

[00:12:00] Yeah. Prav I just come one other thing. I mean, I was one of three Asian people in my school. You know, I’m born and brought up in Redding and the other two were brothers of half growing. So they were really English actually. So, you know, there were very few ethnic people in my school and then there was somebody that they enjoyed. And actually I look back on it and I think, well, that was quite tough. But I think sport cut through everything. And I never had an issue with any of that. And I then look, here are the stories. But I think it’s harder for me to know that actually I’m comfortable in my own skin and I felt I had to. Through just because I had to prove and I think there’s no hardship in a difficulty that you go through as a child because that hardship allows you to become the character you’re going to become. And actually, I’ll share with you, my daughter has some difficulty at school from a couple of the other girls. And I sort of dealt with in a way that what have you learn rather than I’m so sorry.

[00:13:05] I was like, I’m so sorry you went through that, obviously. But tell me what you’ve learnt and how you’re feeling and how would you do that next time. And I didn’t make it a big issue. And my parents definitely didn’t make race a big issue for me growing up. And it was never a big thing. And I would say, as I tell you a little bit more about me into cricket and then becoming a member of the AMCC and then a committee member, I would say all of that background of any all of that is to do with the fact that race was never a thing and I never saw me as a colour. And I think that more that we can make our children feel multicultural from whatever background you’re from. I think that would be a great thing. And I think there’s too much emphasis put on race and the differences that have been achieved. That’s not looking at a thing going forward, which actually then makes the child feel like he’s got to act like something or somebody some.

[00:14:00] You may be lucky in that where you were in reading, there were so few Asians that you were a curiosity. You know, if there were loads of Asians taking the jobs of people, you might have felt it more. Maybe, but but let’s move on from from race, because we talk about that too much, like you just said. Tell me this to me. You sound like a proper competitive person. And, you know, competitiveness has its massive advantages because you set goals. You get that dopamine rush when you win and all that. But I want to hear about the downside of being a competitive person. I mean, do you end up sometimes comparing yourself with others too much or or being really down when you don’t win, when you get in cricket or whatever?

[00:14:46] Yeah, look, I do self isolate if I wasn’t to win, but that’s more just retrospection of what I could have done better. And again, that works on a day to day basis in dentistry. You know, you can have a great day, but you know that you could have done that implant a bit better or finish those veneers a bit better. And so, again, the photography, such an amazing thing, because that’s my teacher on a day to day basis, when I’m doing my dentistry, the patient will walk out saying, well, thanks so much. But actually my will to want to get better is inbuilt advantage.

[00:15:25] Again, I’m sure that was a disadvantage.

[00:15:27] Yeah, but I don’t see us disadvantage at all because actually if I’m competitive, I’m just trying to self improve myself the whole time. And I’m not one to compare from a very young age. My dad being the doctor, he was set one thing straight, really early. Don’t compare yourself to anybody. It just make you unhappy. And actually that’s where my line is actually. For me, it’s just it’s about me and it’s about me and my family. And so obviously we all were different hats at different times. Once as a dentist. One’s a husband, one’s a father, one’s is a friend. And all of these things, it’s I’m wishing well. And so when you wish well for people, I believe that people wish well for me. And that’s karma. So I actually, you know, you asked me, is there anything downside about this? Well, I’ve been trained that there isn’t a downside to being competitive. It just means I know myself and I just would self isolate for a period, make sure I understand. Maybe it might be the drive back home, maybe cricket. I’d probably go in my room for a little bit. I was never a tantrum person. And those that, you know, I don’t shout don’t get angry like I’m not an ant, that is. So there’s no angst in me and I’m wishing well. And so there’ll be times that you actually say, God, that team played really well. And I would then draw on how that team played so well to improve myself.

[00:16:46] So an advantage.

[00:16:49] I hope that I’m not a question, but I don’t see is that.

[00:16:53] Yeah. So tell us about then why did you come work for Jackson as well, or does that just work experience.

[00:17:01] No, like he stayed in my mentor. Even today we speak and we meet and and we. What a great guy. Yeah, exactly. And he I would say he’s firmly one of my mentors that seeing me to my point now in my journey hasn’t finished. But I think that everybody needs mentors in every shape or form through through their life. And I love the fact that clubhouse has been able to access everybody. Now, you can access all these people, you know, these podcasts. You can access people and understand them better. When we were growing up, there was none of this and everybody was seen as an isolated entity. And I think the community. Dentistry and the difficulties we face in isolation in our surgeries, as well as the mental stresses that we take. I would definitely say all of this is positive. If you could keep the barrier of comparison to yourself, to others is a wonderful place because we get isolated. And the fact that you’ve had so many great people on your series so far. And thank you so much, by the way, guys, for having me. That’s really amazing. But I feel honoured to be on here because the people you’ve had on before. But all of this leads to it’s it’s individual, your journeys individual. But I still believe that you’ve got to find your own true north. So tell us about your first practise.

[00:18:24] I’ll tell you quickly, my dad was quite funny. So I went straight from there into VTE from university and VTE was brilliant. I had a mentor again called Pip Gary while in the high street of Slough. I would see everybody in anything and everything was OK if I got it wrong, it was OK. It was all about numbers, except he never came in to teach me dentistry. It never came in. We would have a meeting once a week and it would be on the business of dentistry. He loved the business of dentistry and I’d have to go to the associates to find out how I did that. Could I improve on that? What material using for that. And again, we’ve talk about mentors and people have influenced you. Massive influence on me. He made me understand from an outset the business of dentistry is a business as well as the dentistry. And so therefore, you’ve got in my life two great dentists or business people giving me advice. And therefore my shortfall was very much. Now the clinical side of it. And I felt at the end of that year I wanted to learn more about dentistry and I went to become a house officer, guys. And that’s an interesting story in itself, because they hadn’t had any non graduates. And I’m a Birmingham graduate, be a House officer in the hundred twenty years or whatever at guys.

[00:19:42] And because of this Europe and now they’re becoming kings, they had to invite other people from outside. So they said, OK, the first 12 generally get selected in the year guys to be house offices. So the first 10 did. And they offered to sell and they didn’t even apply for it. Just somebody on my VTE just said, listen, you might want to apply. I know this is going on. It won’t go to the market. And I applied and Nigel Fisher, who was selecting who got it, who got out, I went to see him speak and I said I sent my application and there’s my name, Samir Patel. And he said, Yeah, you’re the cricketer. And I said, Yeah, I’d love to come and be on that team. And then that was the end of that. And I met Shivani, that guy. She was in my group of house officers. And so we had such a phenomenal group that year. We were out a lot and we had a lot of fun. And then dentistry from there was I was still playing a lot of cricket. I was playing England amateurs. I was playing Minor County Cricket Worcester for a little bit with when I was at university and I wanted to go and do a season in Australia playing cricket. And Fraser McDonald, who’s a guy’s in charge of orthodontics, sounded a bit like that.

[00:20:50] Don’t be silly. You can’t go and just give up that issue and go and play cricket because you’ll get crap on your CV. So the next day turned up with a fax, with a job interview and and so what a great bloke. He sort of piece it altogether, new someone out there and had this job for me. So I rang this dinner at 12:00 midnight, say, look, Frasers said I should ring you. I’m coming out to play cricket. I’d love to come and work. She said, just come out and we’ll give you a job. I said, Don’t you have to sponsor me on that? I just come out and give you a job. So did my MSDS at the end of that House of the year and I flew to Australia and I went the next day to go and see Donna. I should I got a job for you. Like, okay, so what do you recommend we do? She goes, Well, I’ve got somebody finishing two and a half weeks. Maybe I could offer you that post, but you’ve got lots to do with registration. And anyway, it all worked out really well. I worked at United Dental Hospital for six months, played cricket for University of New South Wales. And again, we won the great championships out there.

[00:21:58] So we had a phenomenal group of players. And I came back and by that time I met Shivani and we’d got married and I landed a job with Oasis in Twyford, which is again near where I live, near Redding. And again, there was a lot of emphasis on understanding the business. So again, I was just trying to find my form and I did Krystle’s course. I did the stuff of implants. Eastman again, I was thriving knowledge because I feel I was being given business of dentistry, knowledge and understanding how that was. But I was still thriving of now having to understand dentistry. And the one thing I would say that we talk about children earlier, the one thing I’ve learnt from that journey to that point was don’t put your kid out. I was so not burnt out the age of twenty three that I was so thirsty to educate myself at that stage on what I wanted to educate myself on. And I would say that would be a big thing that I’ve learnt from my experiences and I’m passing on to my children, that let’s have a lot of fun. Let’s find out what it is that you’re good at. And as a dad, my job is to get the best out of you and for you to enjoy your life. So, yeah, that’s that’s my point to the oasis.

[00:23:19] It seems to me that your your education is almost like back to from when it comes to practise owners. So a lot of practise owners dive into a practise or a squat. They don’t know what they’re getting themselves into. And by default, they have to learn the business of dentistry. It’s, you know, live or die. Whereas for you it seems like your first job, it was all about the business of dentistry. And the clinical thing was a side thing that you have to find, seek help from other people. And then once again, to Oasis. Do you think that’s the secret to how you’ve been so successful in business with your practise? And also moving on to you’re going to tell us a little bit later on about your business courses. Do you think do you think that has been the key? And do you think dentistry should include a bit of business as part of the curriculum?

[00:24:10] Yeah, I mean, the course is really an understanding of that. We’re not taught it. And I think in dentistry, it’s very much your training, your time for money. And so when we move forward, if there’s anything I could teach younger dentists is invest early and if you invest early, the compound effect of your investing early will mean that you can make the decision whether you work or not when you’re older. And understanding that, as well as the right investments, obviously, I think takes a lot of pressure. And I speak to a few dentists about ethical fighting and making sure we stay on the right side of dentistry and doing it properly. Payman knows me very well in the way that I work in my practise as one of the most clinical awards for any practise. For me, that is the most important 11. So, you know, we have Richard Fields, Shiraz Rollcast, Shibani Patel and Antilla, all these superb clinicians, and it’s all about the quality of dentistry. And therefore, if you’re doing quality dentistry, you will be looked after and it will look after itself. But if you can augment here with investment and the understanding of financial intelligence, I believe that you can make clearer decisions on your life, on how you treat the patient and having them at the primary interest of what you’re doing. And it all comes together and your energy will flow a bit better and your karma will be a bit more relaxed as well, because I think it’s a very stressful environment otherwise piecing it all together.

[00:25:50] So what you’ve what you’ve just said there really makes sense in terms of everything that you’ve put together. But you came from this cricket playing dentist who’s worked in a few practises, has been given a bit business knowledge. What was the actual journey to get from an associate oasis to having this multi award winning practise with super talented clinicians? If you just put that out there and you think about another dentist out there listening to this is such a lofty goal, how do you how do you recruit these super talented people? What is it that you attract them with? And then how do you get to that point? What was your journey from the point that you were an associate to where you are now?

[00:26:32] So from Twyford, again, I believe networking is so important and thankfully I enjoy networking. I said to you earlier, you know, the people side of things I really enjoy. And I went to the PTA local committees and would listen to the lectures in the evenings and ended up being the chairman and the chairman for the GDP. A guy called Steve reduced our practise in Henley and he approached me and he said, look, you’ve got a good reputation. I’m looking for somebody to take over my practise and the partnership. And so I went to see him. And it’s this wonderful Georgian building in the middle of Hanalei High Street. It’s a beautiful building, great you listed. And I was just blown away by it. And then I walked in and it was just, do I belong here? This is so nice. And my two partners were 10 and 12 years older than me respectively. And I thought, well, this is going to be a great training ground for me to to work and and now go to the next step. And I was so excited to own a practise. And I remember Shivani, who always so supportive. It’s like, how are we going to pay for that monthly expenditure that we have to put in the fall? And I said, you know, I think you’ll be OK and you have to take that leap of faith. And then I joined it.

[00:27:47] But interestingly, when I joined it, it was actually very difficult because the vision of my partners was not my vision. And so finding true North had not been found at this stage. It was a tough and quite a few years where I was in this place. The vision of where bit, how they were working, where I was working, the way I wanted to work, the way I want the practise looked like I was I was a little bit claustrophobic. And at that stage, I had now given up playing county cricket and I was just playing club cricket for Ealing, which was great, but I was training quite hard still. And then Anthony, who’s my partner up in London, and he’s an orthodontist. I really respect the way that you talk and the way you work and the way you’re doing stuff. And I’m an orthodontist. Would you I’ve got this. Would you like to do something together? I said I loved doing something to the because I don’t feel I’ve really found what it is that I want to find here. And it was I hadn’t found my true north. And at that stage I didn’t know what it was. And he had found an orthodontic practise in the West End. And when we did all our due diligence, it was very clear that 90 percent was coming from the Internet and 10 percent was referral.

[00:28:57] And so I said, come on, let’s give it a go. So we remortgaged our houses, we put all our savings and we put it into eleven. And we were both had our own practises and we started. So Shravani nice and Anstee started that two days a week and so. Well that’s grown now. Then it was then I brought the then this building blocks, this is all building blocks. So then it was about general dentistry in and then we brought another orthodontist. Since they were busy I brought Peter in who’s my first associate. I brought in there’s a general dentist and now were eighteen of us. But that’s grown just three blocks of getting busier. And if I can share with you how we started at again, it started Prav. As you said, it didn’t start with clinical dentistry. It started with Accenture coming in to come and tell us how a business should run before we started it, so we had capabilities and the orthodontics was divide, it was they were given three options. You can have a match at that stage with metal, metal, metal, ceramic, ceramic, ceramic. And that was their option. And he said, Starbucks, do it. You give them three options. They’ll pick the middle one 80 percent, pick the middle one. So now what you want is 80 percent. Pick that middle one. So we were like, OK, that’s what we’re going to do.

[00:30:10] And then we built in what our overheads were and then we built in how many patients we want to see how we were going to market, how we had to increase our marketing to get those numbers in. And then we achieved the target. And, you know, a lot of it is knowing your numbers as a leader. And from the beginning, I knew my numbers and so happy to say we’ve grown that business 600 percent since we’ve owned it. But it was from understanding that my staff this is my numbers, this is what we’re doing. And then having a plan and having a name. And every year we would have an aim of this is what we want to try and do. It doesn’t mean that we’re selling more stuff. It just means we need to open the top on marketing a little bit more now because that’s not happening. And again, talking about where that comes from, it comes from us being stable and having incomes from our other associates, our other partner jobs, basically. And so therefore, there’s never drive to make 11 a money spinning machine or it was just about having dentistry. And we tore down the whole of dentistry and made it the most remarkable customer experience that we we thought was possible. And we did that with Accenture. To start with

[00:31:22] A couple of questions. When you say CPI’s OK, we’ve got, I don’t know, top line. Bottom line. Did you focus on one of those two? Firstly, no. Well, which one of those two?

[00:31:34] We basically had KPIs. Just understand what our aim was as a

[00:31:38] Company backing key KPIs that you were looking at a

[00:31:41] Large number of bonders, for example, because it was all it was just orthodontics at that stage and that’s all it was. And then we got the lease for upstairs. So at the same time of our profits were trying to refurbish upstairs. And you’ve been upstairs to my room and that space there. And again, it’s it’s an environment where it’s conducive to people wanting to have dentistry and opening their mind of seeing what is possible. So CPI’s a number of bonds, number of new patients seen. And it was very simple. No leads, number of new patients booked in. A number of people went ahead with treatment. That was the journey at that stage.

[00:32:19] And what about what about that sort of, you know, looking at your place and the way you’re discussing it, you’re trying to create sort of raving fans out of your patients instead of just patients. So what are the things you do to to make that happen with a few tips you can give us?

[00:32:37] Yeah, I’d love to share that with you. The first is all receptionists are trained. If somebody asks for money, just ask them about where are they travelling from and if they’ve got if they need a crown and they’ve got a broken tooth. I’m so sorry about that. Are you in any pain at the moment? It’s the whole deflection is not money, because I don’t want to trade money. I want to trade a feeling. So the journey will start from the beginning of somebody feeling well, they’re a bit different. They might make three calls and they’ll say four hundred pounds. Six hundred pounds. And I’m so sorry that you’ve got this problem. Can we get you in today or tomorrow? Is it sharp? How do you know which I mean regarding the Crown I can’t tell because we’ve got a variety of crowns. But let Sameer make the decision which is best for you because that’s, that’s his job. And that would be my job. Your job.

[00:33:31] So the interesting thing is a simple thing, you’re absolutely right. I’ve got a broken tooth that I’m so sorry from the from the receptionist is actually the first thing I’d like to hear is

[00:33:45] How can I help this, my name. And so and then at the end, when you were 11, if any of you want to call calling. I would want your feedback. They should say, is there anything more I can do for you at the end of the call, even with me when I ring? Is there anything more I can do to me? So therefore, you’ve got a concierge at the end of the line for you. So therefore, now, really, money is not the number, it’s oh my God, I’ve got somebody looking after me. And then it’s about when they turn up and the feel of the place and the balance of what the website looks like and the aura and the colour of your surgeries and your waiting room. And the trust starts from there of like you’ve walked from your website into the waiting room and they’re feeling this is OK. This is exactly what I thought it would be. And trust starts there. And then they come and see you and you just want to know about them. And we use photographs, we discuss what their concerns are. But when we do it, I always say that if Henry and Henry Ford did market research, they wanted faster horses and he built a car. So when you come and see somebody who feels they can look after you and who’s done all these years of training, it shouldn’t be the passion that drives the treatment plan. It should be the dentist to educate the patient. And this is what it is. And at that stage, we then click how we make the plan and then taken away by a treatment coordinator. And I don’t really talk about money at that stage because my job’s health care driven and therefore often we didn’t have the treatment coordinator and sometimes we still don’t.

[00:35:22] But I think that’s a really important side of it. If you want to convert large treatment plans and make people have comprehensive care dentistry. So a lot of what we do is at 11:00 is when people have that single to dentistry for many years and they’re now looking for somebody who can take care of them for comprehensive care, they often see us. But actually, in your own practises, I would love you guys to be saying what I’ve been doing, single tooth dentistry. A lot of it’s going on. Let me take some photos and let me show you what I think we should be doing to take care of your mouth, to make sure you have less emergencies. And that style of dentistry takes a lot of pressure off your staff yourself. Everybody has a role. One of the I mean, I have so many mantras, but one of the thing is leave your jersey in a better place. And I don’t understand why people work for somebody for 20 years. I mean, like, what are you doing? That’s funny, but I’ve had four CEO roles of eleven Dental. I don’t want the same people working for me. You know, my receptionist who’s now my practise manager. I have a dream coordinator who is my receptionist. And it’s like we want everybody to keep getting better, learn more, learn more. It’s just not me. It’s not my clinical team. It’s everybody. So when I started in the practise managers I had, they would not be my practise manager. I want today. My treatment is not the same treatment coordinates and how

[00:36:39] Much training do you do for your team? What’s the what’s the sort of you know, because these are Prav knows this better than anyone else. Right? You can you can talk to a team about phone manner once, and they might do it for a couple of months, but it needs constant training. So what would you do? What sort of training regime for these people?

[00:36:59] Yeah, I think I just trying to get them passionate about their job and passion about their job means that they will over deliver to you as your principal and macro manager. Don’t micromanage at all. I said you earlier, I’ve got very relaxed demeanour about myself. I tell them I’m there, but I’m not interested in micromanaging. And there are just a few ground rules and don’t come to me with a problem. Come up to me with a solution because I’m employing good people to have the solutions. And it might be I change those, but then you will understand what it is that we want to try and achieve after a few times. You’ve got it wrong. And I would say meeting after meeting after meeting, you know, there’s a lot of meetings and there’s an understanding of culture. That’s the thing I set within the practise. So then when somebody joins, they’re totally understanding. So at the moment, the reception was just taken on a buyer for River Island and she’s got no experience in dentistry. However, she’s a buyer for River Island, who is great at customer service and the ability to understand finance and tracking and following up and all the rest of it.

[00:38:05] So I think trying to identify really amazing people who have a growth mindset similar to you. And I’ll give you an example of my practise manager. She came as a receptionist with a bit of accountancy background, and now she’s my practise manager. So everybody will grow and you want them to grow. And Richard Branson’s thing is we want my I want my staff to grow because they are looking after my business. And, you know, I’m only there one and a half days a week in London. So they represent me the whole time. And sometimes that’s a disadvantage because I would love to get more time and more training and and more influence. But actually, I think sometimes it works as a positive because they can just get on, not have the pressure of the boss. And I think the way that one leads in is a reflection of you. If you are comfortable, you will let them be comfortable. And I think that’s the place that we want to try and make Dental take them to a lot more and put them in a place that they feel more comfortable.

[00:39:09] Now, you keep referring back to True North. Just tell us a little bit more about what that means to you and what your true north is.

[00:39:18] True north is when you you’re doing something and you just go to sleep to refresh and go again. And so that’s true north, that’s where we all need to be, that’s where everybody wants to be, where you just go, you’re doing something. So I got a nice bedtime. There we go to sleep, go to bed and then wake up next morning. And I’d have no alarm clock for four years. I’d wake up at five, 30, do my yoga meditation, write down my list of stuff I got to do, play with the kids. I’m out the door. Go again. So true north is when you find something you’re so passionate about that it’s not a work. It’s not a job. Of course, everybody has days that they don’t feel the need or it’s a job. But actually, once you find something that you’re so passionate about, actually it doesn’t become a job and therefore life becomes very easy. And all the energies within you flowing and your energy level and your and your the whole movement of you is feeling great. It’s not feeling tense. It’s not feeling stress. It’s not feeling worried. And a bit of it’s finance in today’s world. I’d love for people to understand how to invest better as an example and books they should read and all of this education. I generally have three or four books on the go the whole time. You know, wherever I get a chance like that or even if I’m having a massage, I’ve got an audio book on like it’s going in in the car. It just clicks in. There’s no second that we’re not listening to an audio book or thirsty for knowledge or understanding. Now, not everybody is going to be is wired like me, but thirsty for knowledge means you’re growing yourself. And I suppose that comes through Payman to earlier my staff. I want them to feel that as well. I my job is to make them the best they can be, not hold onto them for ten or fifteen years in a practise because my practise then becomes stale.

[00:41:16] What are some of your favourite books, books that changed your

[00:41:20] Books that changed me? I think the telomere effect fairly recently is a wonderful book about health and it’s written by Nobel Prise winner. And it makes you understand how you can change yourself very quickly. The telomere effect. So that’s health. I love legacy. And it’s all about why the All Blacks have a success rate of 80 percent and the next best team is in the 60 percent. And it’s because they have a great culture and it me and it’s the most to most experienced team members will clean down the dressing room and leave it as they found it, regardless of wherever they play. So, again, that’s a great book for culture. I think Richard Khordad, to make people understand money and being financially free and just simple sort of understanding of finance, I think that’s a great book. I could keep going. I missed a great book, Just Understanding Business. And again, I love Simon Sinek and his mentality to infinite business mentality. Same in myself. It doesn’t stop. Why should it stop? Why should we finish? Nothing should finish. Everything should be infinite

[00:42:32] And do so in all of this. What you’ve been talking about, it sounds super successful. You’ve started off this journey. We mentioned in business from day one as an associate right through to having probably one of the most successful practises in the UK. And what really rings true there is you spend one and a half days there. So it really is a true business, right? It operates without you. What have been some of the darkest moments during that journey where you’ve really hit rock bottom? Can you share some of those with us? Because there must have been, even despite having all these advantages of being tuned into business from job number one, it must have been some big mistakes or some dark moments that you can share with us where it just it wasn’t quite going to fun.

[00:43:17] Yeah. First of all, I have made a lot of mistakes, and I think you speak to anybody that’s successful, they’ll say that they made a lot of mistakes and therefore I am happy to try them. And if you’re happy to try stuff, of course, you fall over. So I would say I think I probably would have made more mistakes than most, but that’s part of just giving it a go and then having that confidence. I hope it works and put my energy into that. And I would say constantly we sort of get it wrong and we’ve got to readjust it. Even the other day with one of my reception team, I sort of said we’re going to change things around. And then she came to see me and told me her point of view and I realised now I got it wrong. Absolutely, I got it wrong. But I would say my hardest days were definitely when I became a principal in a practise and I knew there was no direction, which was similar to where I wanted to take the practise. And I was being told that my style of Dental was different to theirs. And the comprehensive approach is not the right way.

[00:44:20] So I would say that that was very difficult because I was going through a period of playing cricket three or four times a week and working three times a week and then going to working five days a week, as well as being an owner, being a principle, being aligned with my partners that weren’t aligned with me. And they are great people, by the way. They’re really lovely people. It’s just they weren’t aligned with me. And I’m still here. I’m here in Henley giving this interview and I’m great friends with them. We are now a lot of water under the bridge with no recourse of what happened then, because I’ve learnt from it and often my tormentors have become my mentor. So I love the fact that it was so difficult then and I became even thirstier to become better as a dentist. So I would say they were definitely my hardest days. And also when we took over 11, when we had sort of roll the dice of Prav putting everything in and I will still go back to none of the three partners got paid for one year and only Shivani got paid the second year. And then we started drawing in the year three.

[00:45:28] So again, there were times where we had our principles in place and we weren’t drawing any money, but we were fortunate that we had other businesses where we could live from. But they were not easy days because you’ve taken over this massive seven, four, seven business in central London and you’re young and everybody’s older than you and everybody appears very established and very confident. And I haven’t even got any grey hairs. And and it was just tough. But I suppose my network at that stage, they were all entrepreneurs and they were going through the same thing. And I would say that I had a lot of solace in hanging out with friends that were going through the same as what I was at that stage, especially when we took over 11. And it was really struggling to get off the ground with this big jumbo jet. And I just think it was great having people around me going through the same stuff. So I would say they would be my darkest or hardest days. But but saying that Prav, as you know me, a very positive, they became the most important days for me to be who I am today

[00:46:36] While we’re on it. What’s been your biggest clinical mistakes and what have you learnt from those?

[00:46:43] Yeah, I think the biggest clinical mistake is to treat anybody. And actually, I’m such a big believer in treating people that you want to treat and have the same values and have come to see you. And so I’m lucky enough now. A bit more experience that often happens as it comes to recommendation, but when you start, you want to treat everybody and if I can make a big sort of shout out to people starting their careers or starting their practise, I would say just make sure you’re comfortable with everybody, Yewtree and some you might not get right. And you can sort of get through it, but don’t treat everybody because they’re going to be some people you can never, ever satisfy. Even if you did the best dentistry that you could do and you can get you know, you could get the ball out the ground six out of six and they would still not be happy. And I think preparation of having a good team

[00:47:37] Is a particular episode that you can

[00:47:42] Tell the wrong to perforate the canal, that sort of thing.

[00:47:45] No, I go back to when I think guys, we used to drink so much like it used to be a concern to these students, these White House officers. And I remember who I used on PEDs and this boy, 16 year old boy, came in for an extraction of a lower left six. And I had had a skinful the night before and I was wearing my mask and I said to my nurse, can you call the patient and sign the consent? He’s 16 from the parents. And please don’t bring the parents in because I stink of booze. And he came in and I stop giving the local on the opposite side, just put the needle in and I came out straight away, going up the wrong side, put it in the other side, gave the local and the poor kid said to me, why don’t you put it in both sovereigns? I said, sometimes as we cross over nodes. And I said, from that day, I am not. So that was the end of me boozing or having more than a couple of glasses before I work. And so that was it. I would say that that was not a good place to be. And I learnt my lesson very quickly.

[00:48:55] That lesson is kind of obvious. What the previous thing you talked about, was there a patient that you couldn’t please or you didn’t judge them? Right. We had Paul Pomerol and he said the lesson he had a massive situation with his brother, with being sued and all that. And he said the lesson you learnt from that was that even the people you really, really, really get on with could turn. So you advised that you don’t treat everyone. So he was saying sometimes you think the person is absolutely right and it could turn ugly. So did you have one of those episodes

[00:49:33] You saw the lady of 11, about 20 percent fly in to see us. And there was one time a lady had come in from Jersey and she was a lovely Indian lady. And I think I even said, I’m going to treat you like I would treat my mama. I think I said that she brought up later on and she had some concerns and we got along so well and it was orthodontics followed by four a.m. and it would seem like that was the plan. And at the end of orthodontics, she was super happy. And the Provisionals, she was super happy. And always after I was on, I see everybody for a review to check the colour, to control everything. And that’s my protocol. And I went against that protocol because I rang her and said, how is everything? She said, everything’s fine about this one. Maybe we can make that bit short and rotate it. And I said, okay. And she came back and she wasn’t she wasn’t the phone. And she signed the disclaimer after we call them, and she was happy. And in the end she went to five consults to see if it was OK.

[00:50:41] And I paid for those consults and all those all the Dental said it was absolutely superb. Yeah, she wasn’t happy. And in the end, she came back and said, actually, I’ve now had some time. I think it looks really good, but I want half my money, otherwise I’m going to kick up a stink. So what do you do? You then manage it to say actually, well, you’ve reached it and I won’t tell you what I did because I don’t think it’s relevant to the whole thing. But what it means is stick to your protocol, stick to the way you do stuff. And again, all of these are just learning lessons. You know, when you’re in it, you think, oh, God, what a helmet, why do I do that? But then you realise actually stick to your protocol, stick to the system, stick to what you do and try not to go out of that too much, because actually that’s when you produce the best clinical dentistry and the most effective.

[00:51:34] And I mean, look, you put the final videos on. You said you liked it, then you cemented it on his face. You didn’t like it. Is that what happened?

[00:51:43] Yeah, pretty pretty much. I came back for the review and then said, no, I’m not that happy with it,

[00:51:48] Because if you had followed your protocol, you still would have probably ended up in the same situation in a way.

[00:51:53] Perhaps, perhaps. But again, when I look back at myself and said, where did I go wrong? Because I. And again, you know, the sports mentality is you could try to control the bulls. That’s what happened. But then you do. I gave the money back. That’s not the right thing to do because I didn’t want the hassle. But I don’t I know you so well.

[00:52:14] And this is supposed driven person. Let’s talk about the courts. Well, it’s interesting, man. It’s interesting. Sometimes you have to buy your way out of this sort of problem, even if it’s a good idea, it’s your principles. Yeah, you’re right. You’re right. Tell us about the course. But because it’s a very interesting idea, it’s a year course for purely non-clinical stuff, including some clinical as well.

[00:52:44] Yeah. And so, look, it came from lock down.

[00:52:47] And I mean, it’s got a name.

[00:52:50] Yeah, it’s called the Dental Entrepreneurial Programme. And you’ll find on a Dental Leaders dotcom elite Dental Leaders dot com. And the programme is called Dental Entrepreneurs Programme. And it’s very much for people who are interested in the non-clinical side of things, but also how to marry that up into the clinical side. And the whole of the first. It’s a module, it’s over one year. So so we’re all together. It’s only a small cohort of limited numbers. And we then go on this journey together like an MBA style. And so the first two days will be all about finding your true north, understanding what good leadership looks like, because leadership varies for everybody. It’s not the same leadership for everybody and understanding yourself. And we’re so lucky. We’ve got a Harvard Business School graduate and an educator coming to run that Hassan Khan. I mean, obviously, I’ll be sharing a lot of my stories in dentistry, but almost he is going to take care of that and say what they learn at Harvard Business School about running a business and what tips that they can give. The second module is about brand and team and culture and so on, brand, again, I’ll share with the delegates exactly what we have done at 11 and why the brand is so important rather than the individual.

[00:54:16] Obviously, you’ve got to have a brand yourself as a dentist, but the brand individual is very important. And we have the GM of Nike UK coming to tell us about how they have literally pivoted from being a consumer business into a virtual business, but also what Nyaka doing to maintain their presence as a high performer. So I’m trying to bring the elite of both in business and in sport together to allow us to all understand where we’re headed because our journeys are all different. And then the team and ship is going to be run by the Clive Woodward who won, who was the leader when England won the World Cup and how he put his whole team together and the mantra of being together and how he dealt with difficult individuals and how he put them within the team and how the team planned and how they did it all together. And it’s the DNA of a champion is his lecture.

[00:55:12] And this is what all these guys will patients

[00:55:14] Know they’re either friends or people that I now know well. So, again, I’d ask them to be involved with this and so lucky that they’re open to helping people go to the next level of the third module. It becomes a little bit more clinical and understanding how we do on new patient appointments at all, the way from the phone calls, how we answer them to treatment planning and how to change single tooth dentistry to comprehensive to Dental, which is what we do every day as dentists.

[00:55:43] So that if it is, I guess maybe from the clinical aspect, most valuable piece is that

[00:55:50] I mean I mean, it’s going to it’s so exciting because that’s when we’ve now found what you’re all about. You found it. Identify where you’re going to go. But actually the clinical side is what we connect us. And so I will share with you how we convert those single tooth dentistry patients into comprehensive how we do a new patient appointment and how important photography is. And Menasche Patel from Focus is going to come and do the whole photography side of things to me on that. And then finally, it will be the fourth module is about financial intelligence, how to understand your business, but also to create wealth. And my mantra on that is most dentists are one step away from being wealthy and it’s this financial intelligence module that’s going to help you to do it.

[00:56:38] Well, of course, so it’s eight days,

[00:56:41] It’s eight clinical days, obviously, there’s a lot of reading that goes alongside the this of Harvard Business School myself, we’ve put together during these three months times your way. But there will be meetings for the cohorts through that period on their commitments through that phase. It’s going to be held at Lord’s Cricket Ground, which is the home of cricket, which is, you know, and so that really brings it home for me as well. And if you want to know more, go to Dental, Leaders dot com. And we have sold half of the course at the moment and there’s an application form on there at the moment. But I’m sure if it’s successful, we will run it another cohort in the year to come.

[00:57:19] And just what’s the investment for that programme?

[00:57:22] It’s twelve thousand pounds for the full year.

[00:57:26] So moving forward, what’s the plan for whether you’ve grown sevenfold, six fold, six fold, you’ve grown six fold. Is there an exit strategy here? Is it now a business that just sort of looks after itself? You there are one and a half days away. Is there another practise in the pipeline?

[00:57:45] And there’s a whole chain coming. Isn’t going to go now.

[00:57:49] Look, I think it’s a very boutique practise. And the people we found that work within it, we work really well. We love creating high quality dentistry. And I get a lot of joy from my dentistry there. And so there’s no plan at the moment. We there is still space to grow. And so, as always, there will be a three month board meeting with action plans in place and we will hopefully just continue growing that

[00:58:20] The practise looks. Did you change that or did it look like that when you when you bought it?

[00:58:26] I’d love to share with you those pictures of before and somehow try and get them to you. It used to be reception. There was a there was a chair in there that had no spittoon and no sink. The lounge was blue carpet with four yellow stools. The bathroom had a baby changing area. And the ladies, it was horrific. There was one nice room at the back and upstairs was just a derelict shell where a paediatric doctor used to work.

[00:58:56] Oh, so you did all of that yourself. And so did you have an interior designer and architect? And so we had an architect.

[00:59:05] And I have to say, Shivani has been instrumental in the way that we have managed that. And so I would say the architect with Shivani, because, you know, your practise is an is an extension of you and we always wanted it to be asked that was doing that. And I would say that that is one of the whole things we say. We build trust as dentists. It’s got to go from websites to the way it looks, to the way you talk and the way you present and all your literature and everything. It’s got to be on

[00:59:33] Point because stunning building. Tell me about Shibani 11. Does she have only a clinical role or does she have a management role? And how many days is she there? And where are you the rest of the week?

[00:59:46] Yes. So Shivani is a clinical partner at eleven and she said two days a week and she comes from a background of being a hospital consultant. So she very much is in charge of the day to day the systems that are put in place and the way we run the practise from a clinical side, almost bringing that that from the hospital environment. This is how it was done, this how it should be done. These are the standards. So we all have very different roles as partners at the practise and we don’t try and overlap. I don’t try and get involved with that. Yes, I’ll have input. I’m obviously running the business marketing and I’m in charge of recruiting and actually looks for technologies and how we can become more efficient in the practise. So we all have very different roles and I think that’s symbiotic relationship is is is one of the success.

[01:00:32] What you do? The rest is on the one half days you’re there, where are you?

[01:00:35] The rest from two and a half days clinical in Henley and I have Fridays nonclinical and I try and get all my letters, all of the things that you need to run a practise. But I have a lot of people around me that help me run this. So I’m a firm believer of having the right people. You can delegate to that you can trust, which allows you to then to take stuff to the next level, because if you’re in the weeds, you really can’t then start planning for the rest of it. So having good team around you to start taking stuff off of you is a critical thing I would recommend to any leader out there as well.

[01:01:11] Good questions. I go to a lot of practises where there’s no element of performance related incentivization. Do you believe in that or.

[01:01:20] No, we have never performance driven our staff because we’re a health care business. But what what they do know is that there is a target in place at the end of each month that they are not privy to. And I believe they don’t need to know it, because if they do their role right, the practise will achieve that. And so once we achieve that, we do things that I think quite extraordinary, like we have closed down June shoes and gone in and allowed the girls to pick any shoe that they want with champagne in their shop. We Nike have given us vouchers that we can pick any shoe that the girls want if they achieve that target cocktail making evenings at a local place in Mayfair around the corner. So I believe in bringing the team together on a deeper level than a financial level is actually keeps your staff and keeps them loyal. But I believe paying good staff the right amount from the beginning. So therefore, that’s not the issue.

[01:02:26] If I was an associate and I want to be ambitious, I want to work in the West and I want to maybe work at your place. Would you look for would you look for an associates? You look more for the attitude than for the skills, because I’ve talked to a lot of associates and they go, well, I’ve been on this course. I’ve been on that course. Of course. Then I talk to you cats, the owners of these big private places. And a lot of times you guys aren’t looking for that. You’re looking for the patient management more than the clinical.

[01:02:55] Yeah. I mean, we’ve never gone to market for any of the associates. They’ve all been referral recommendation to date. Yeah. So that for me is a really important part of bringing culture in, because then they’ve got they’ve got I’ve just sort of said this is how we work, this is the way we want stuff. And then I totally get it. I want to be on board. And so when you set a culture from the beginning, people then will then align to that. But I think the big thing that I look for is people are a bit like myself, absolutely committed to excellence in clinical dentistry. And so they’re always self improving the keeping going. They’re keeping learning. And I think more than ever, the quality of their photography and perhaps an Instagram account allows me to see how good they are. It’s not that Instagram is important, because if they showed me a good quality photographs of what they do, I can understand that that’s the type of person I want. So I would say clinical photography and good records and a good story book of who you are as well as well presented and the ability to be able to educate patients and speak to them and communicate with them and and engage with them. All of that is what I would be looking for. And if you’re not able to engage or be able to be with anybody like that, you’ve got to learn how to go and understand how to put yourself on, not Dental course on how to how to read course.

[01:04:16] But it’s interesting, you know, I mean, look, I don’t really practise Prav you do that. If two associates present and one has fifty thousand followers and the other doesn’t, you’re going to go for the one with fifty thousand followers on you. Why? Because he’s going to bring in patients

[01:04:32] If that’s what you want. Patients. Yeah. Or the right type of patients. Right.

[01:04:37] Do you. Well do you think so.

[01:04:41] Yeah. I think you want both of those actually I think are still on the fence that you want the right type of quality patients, you want a lot of them. But I think somebody that could that’s going to do the wrong type of dentistry is going to ruin your brand as well. At the same time, you want to feel that trust and perhaps a few meetings and getting them to spend time with you or everybody will spend the day with me before they would start anyway. So again, they know the way the practise works, that it should be as much they choose you as you choose then.

[01:05:10] Yeah, but I could imagine, for instance, if you have one or two years out of university or even five or six years out of university, coming to work at yours is one of those things that a lot of people would like to do. I mean, it’s a great position, I guess I’m saying that right. But what I need to do, it’s interesting. You know, I’d I’d say to a young guy, you know, learn Instagram and learn digital marketing before doing that. MSE Yeah. Because in our world there’s loads of people with messages. Yeah. That’s not the thing that’s going to actually put you above. It’s an interesting world we live in. I mean, I find it amazing that I’m even saying this, but things are moving quickly now. The real

[01:05:51] Issue for sure, I mean, Prav you made the point earlier that it’s that all roundedness that you want,

[01:05:56] Right.

[01:05:57] Erm actually I think there’s some practise will be dying for that and there’ll be other principles that will stay clear of that. And so that would be definitely driven by the principle and the way that that practise was run. Mm.

[01:06:11] Who does the firing. Does that.

[01:06:13] You me talk to me about that night because I do it, it never gets easier and I have that conversation with myself probably ten, fifteen times, probably more. The words I’m going to say how I’m going to do it. My heart rate’s pounding and then you just get it out of your system and it’s like a massive weight off your shoulders. But you just talk us through that, the whole process of fine and maybe an experience where you’ve had. To do it, and it’s been a little bit easier.

[01:06:39] Yeah, I’m just really open on this. It’s not quite working. These are the reasons you’re a great person. If they are, and I wish you all the best, that’s it.

[01:06:49] And it is your approach to it in the build up of it. Is it totally unemotional, just facts driven. And this is what it is. Or just you get

[01:06:59] A little bit if you got to when you know you’re I mean, you guys know me, but it’s the businesses first. It’s not me. So therefore, for the business, this is the right thing to do and therefore it’s not difficult. Yeah. And also, I’ll give you one example. We had four staff, 11 this, this. And I say this was this was D-Day for us. And I went in I fired three on one day and we had one staff because the culture that was being created was wrong. And we’re going to rebuild from here. So don’t be frightened to do that, because if the culture is wrong and somebody being the bad, get rid of them soon. I mean, I generally I would say now with experience, I would get rid of them sooner rather than later. So therefore it doesn’t become difficult.

[01:07:45] And thus I like I like that because on the one side, you’re coming across all soft and touchy feely, but on the other side, you know, you’re strong on the things you believe in. You’re strong for doing it. It’s been lovely having you know, we’re pushed for time now to Prav Joona.

[01:08:07] Yeah. Yeah. So, Semir, imagine it’s your last day on the planet and you’ve got your loved ones around you and you’ve got you’ve got to leave them with three pieces of life wisdom or they’d be.

[01:08:26] Three pieces of life wisdom have infinite spirit, don’t think it’s ever going to end. Just keep going, keep going and have that infinite spirit, I think treat life like a game. And actually, it becomes really fun. Everything is like a small game. And you either win some, you lose some. And it’s OK. Don’t be hard on yourself. Worked hard enough out there. So don’t be hard on yourself and love and not hate, because actually, you know, that’s what’s going to come back to you. And if you’re somebody that enjoys love, then love back and it will come back to you.

[01:09:03] Worked love game for you guys.

[01:09:07] And how would you like to remember you spoke about legacy? What would you like your legacy to be? Samir was finished the sentence.

[01:09:18] Semir was very keen to help and was there when I needed him. I believe there’s lots of friendships out there, but I also know that we all go through ups and downs and great friends turn up when you need them the most, not when they’re superficial.

[01:09:37] So true. And if you had a month left, what would you do with your time? Play loads of cricket.

[01:09:43] Now I’m done playing cricket off now, so I’d probably be playing golf. But I would say with this infinite spirit, I would still I love travelling. I would continue to travel and go to somewhere where I hadn’t seen and explore that area and find a coffee shop and write about that in that area.

[01:10:04] Where’s your favourite place that you have been?

[01:10:07] I would say Australia is very close to my heart with with the stuff I did, but we were very fortunate. We got away before lockdown at Christmas and we probably had our best family holiday in Antigua just this Christmas. Yeah. And the girls are growing up and we would never go away for too long. Obviously, the business and the rest of it and Foreston said we’re going to lock down. So our original 10 day holiday turned into three and a half weeks out there. And that was a wonderful break and a wonderful time with the family with no agenda because we knew very little was happening when we came back.

[01:10:42] I love that, I love that. Thank you so much for having me. Thank you. Thank you so much on the show.

[01:10:50] Thanks, guys. Appreciate you having me on

[01:10:53] The course at Lord’s, you know, our offices around the corner. So they pop in and say, hey, I would love that. Thank you so much, but thank you. Well, yes,

[01:11:07] This is Dental Leaders, the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging leaders history. Your house, Payman, Langroudi and Prav Solanki.

[01:11:23] 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 got some value out of it

[01:11:37] If you did get some value out of it. Think about subscribing and if you would share this with a friend who you think might get some value out of it, too. Thank you so, so, so much for listening. Thanks.

[01:11:48] And don’t forget our six star rating.

[00:00:00] And I would say to my students, this is a service in our culture, to bow your head and serve someone is not to demean yourself. It’s like the highest form of love. And so I believe that I really believe them. And so for me, that’s what the ethos of this clinic is about.

[00:00:22] This is dental leaders, the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging leaders in dentistry.

[00:00:34] Your hosts Payman Langroudi and Prav Solanki, it gives me great pleasure to welcome Fazeela Khan-Osborne to the podcast because he has become a household name in the area of employment policy and teaching of Implantology. It’s lovely to have you on the on the show Fazeela. This podcast really about getting to the person behind the persona. And we always kind of start with the same question. Where were you born? How did you end up in dentistry? What kind of childhood did you have?

[00:01:06] Thanks for having me, guys. Real pleasure and privilege. I’m a West Indian kid. I was born in Guyana, in Georgetown in the 60s, mid 60s, and I was born to two parents that were human rights judges. And we traveled around based on wherever that was predominantly sent to. So we were a British Empire. Kids really in that sense, grew up in the sunshine, walked on the seawall every day after work. You can imagine mum and dad in the front and the rest of us trailing behind. Really happy childhood, as I was saying, to prevail here. I’ve got five brothers, so I’m No. Five of six and technically I’m the shortest. So, you know, I’m not the youngest, but I’m the shortest. So, you know, we just grew up with very simple, no TV, no phones, nothing like that. If we if we were having a birthday and we were having a movie that we’d fire the projector and the Disney movie would come out. It was that kind of thing, very outdoor life. So we’re really happy. Life came here, came here every year, actually, because when you were in that service, my parents were diplomats. You had to come to the UK as well as somewhere else, wherever you wanted to go. So we came here a lot. And then we finally my father was very British, obviously, and was educated here as well as my mum. So we came here in the late seventies. Seventy five, seventy six. And we came here for education. The political situation at home had got to the point where it was very dangerous for us. My dad was chief justice at the time our mail was opened. Every other phone call was a bit hard for one. And when you’re 10, 12 year old kids, that’s quiet. You look out the window and you see kids walking around and you you wonder what made you be behind the door and they’d be the other side of it. So, you know, I was very grateful, but my parents really came here to give us a better life.

[00:03:12] You remember actually the moment of arriving in New York, I remember.

[00:03:17] Yeah, absolutely. And I remember you. I was just coming up to 12. But what I remembered more was because National Service was becoming a conscription for women as well as men.

[00:03:30] I was coming up to 11 was the age and I was coming up to 12. So I was even past my sell by date on that one. And I remember being woken up one morning and bundled into a car with my brothers and looking out the window at the help, because obviously in that part of the world, you have a cook and a gardener people to help you. And then just part of your family, really. And I remember looking at them and thinking, I’m never going to see you again, but I didn’t know where we were going and I didn’t know if we were ever coming back.

[00:04:00] So I remember that vividly arriving arriving in the late 70s. You came, right? That was the winter of discontent. Yeah. So from all the bright colors to that sort of gray ju ju ju ju ju remember thinking you’ve downgraded.

[00:04:18] I remember thinking was the sun you know, why people why don’t people understand my English with my twang. And it was very it was, it was still the days of all the signage where you were the only colored kid in school. You were the only. I grew up in Richmond, so it was a very white middle class area. Very nice, but very, you know, a lonely place. If you didn’t have people that were like nice school. But, you know, it was tough. It was tough in the first days. And people would say, you know, when you go in home or, you know, that was when I was first introduced to the word walk, which I didn’t really know what that meant. I remember going home and saying to my mom, what’s the word she was? And she would say, oh, was that started already? But it sounds silly to say, but I didn’t really realize that I was a color till I got here. We were just kids. We just loved life. And that didn’t really come into our consciousness at all.

[00:05:20] So it was a bit of a rough start from that point of view due to the name calling and the and the the racism, so to speak. How did that manifest on you?

[00:05:31] At the beginning? It was just, you know, a little bit of it was a lot of names and it was a little I was the kid with long hair, pigtails and glasses, so, you know. Mm. Not fun. I got to five foot five when I was about twelve and didn’t go much after that. So I mean, you know, it was just and the thing is because I always had a brother in the school, it helped. But you did feel it was something you had to get used to and you did get used to it because the signs were still out in restaurants saying that you couldn’t go in or whatever, it was getting better, but it wasn’t done yet. And you were very aware of being in the minority in that society, let’s put it that way. But you were also very aware that your parents are working, but don’t, you know, work, working all day and you got to pull together. And and we just we’re very tight because apparently the lawyers my dad was was a human rights judge and my mum was appointed as a first female human rights judge, literally three months before we left. And so she didn’t take up post, but they were both barristers, essentially what they were doing here as well. Yeah, yeah. Although when we when we came here, you see my dad was fifty three when I was born well so but he was like forty, he was running around like baby and very, very active with his kids and my mum was sixteen years younger than him so we wouldn’t have to, I mean he was definitely, she was definitely the, the cool, calm, collected one. So we were really lucky. But he was already semi retired and still putting three kids through school because the kids had gone, but the bottom kids weren’t so. So it was tough for them because we had when you left a situation like that, all your money was there. So you kind of had to start again a little bit. So, yeah.

[00:07:31] When did dentistry come on to you? Oh, not for radar.

[00:07:35] I mean, why dentistry when you have both parents and in the US, I often wonder that I was the kid that brought the dog with the label like home with the kids that brought the kid home who who didn’t have didn’t have a nice home to go home to and they’d sit and eat with us. I’ve always been a caring person. I’ve always loved looking after people. I’ve always wanted to look after people. So I always knew that I would be interested or want to spend a decent part of my life doing that. So obviously, medicine would be. The thing that we turn to and I had also a member of my family who is a radiologist, so that was kind of going that way and I actually ended up starting there and then deciding, funnily enough, now that I’m out of surgery, funnily enough, deciding I don’t want to do medicine because I don’t want to do surgery. So I ended up with a medical biochemistry physiology degree and it kind of got very interested in genetics and that kind of thing. And I ended up working for Paul Nurse actually ICRA for a year to do my PhD and then decided I didn’t really want to kill animals for a living. So I fell into it really because I went to do my PhD at the Royal London with a guy who you guys are probably too young to know is a guy called Spears, who was a professor of physiology in relation to saliva.

[00:09:01] And I started my study with him and he said, why are you here? Why why are you in this lab when you should be out with people? And and it was you know, research is a hard taskmaster, really. And he said to me, go to dentistry. You love people, you’re good with your hands, go to the tree and you’ve only got to do anatomy. It’s only a term. And that was the time when you could do that and go straight into clinical, you know, the three, the full year. And so that’s what I did. What was your deal? It was on the saliva and there were a couple of genes in saliva and couple of proteins that we were looking at. The what how did that give you protection against dental disease? And I only did it for six months. So it didn’t amount to a lot. But it taught me to be really focused and to be really disciplined about what I did. And that, you know, I come from a very science background. So that that helped me a lot with dentistry, because dentistry for me is apart from the lovely bit of actually caring about someone, it’s really about the protocol and making sure that you do it in the right way. And I sort of get that quite easily.

[00:10:20] So I’m from there. Obviously, you went through dental school, and how did you find that? Were you sort of somebody who was sort of top of your class and all that sort of thing?

[00:10:31] No, I had a great time in dental school, so I wasn’t. But I was kind of in the middle. We had thirty three in my year and I was always around number eight, nine, that kind of thing. And I wasn’t I could do it. But there was nothing special on the hospital. Yeah, it was when it was actually the London hospital. So there was a big and I was really lucky because I had a great year and you know, we had a laugh and we had a good social life and and we worked hard, too, but we played hard as well.

[00:11:08] So which did you qualify as a dentist? Nineteen ninety four. OK, same same time. Yeah.

[00:11:16] I mean what did you think then would you did you go like did you have it in those days?

[00:11:22] Yeah, it was just coming in and I basically decided to run for you. Yeah. And I didn’t, I didn’t really want to do it and I really didn’t because I didn’t want to be sent to Colchester to do it. And I really got that year, the final year the Royal London or the London was really good at, you know, different hospitals are good at stuff. We were good at oral surgery. We wanted to get a tons of conservation, but guys were. So I really started to to to go towards oral surgeon because it was something I was really barbershops, basically, and I wanted to be better. And then I won the surgical prize and something happened that year because normally you’d get housetop when you’re in hospital, you know, and if you didn’t get it, then you wouldn’t get it anywhere else. And I remember walking past the the staff room of the oral surgeon room and overhearing a member of staff saying, well, I’m not giving her the job. And it really pissed me off. And I thought, right. And I’ve done a really good rotation and everybody was fine and I had a good time and did the job well. And the remarks that came back were really good. And I thought, I’m not going to give you the satisfaction of turning me down.

[00:12:37] So I didn’t apply. And I applied instead with John Langdon, who had done a bit of research with and I got an interview and I got a house job at Jorges instead, which was great. So I left and I just thought, I’m not doing that, not playing that game. And I just found that there was a little bit of that kind of thing going on in hospital. Even though I loved hospital, I didn’t like the politics at all. So I went to Georgia, do my husband job, and then I went to Keen’s to do the second bit. And then I decided to go back to London now on my own terms. But this time I was seeing one of the staff members married to him. So that was a bit awkward. But he was in restorative and I was in surgery, so it didn’t matter. And I spent another 12 to 18 months there doing right up to locum registrar. And then I went and did great woman straight in Newcastle. So I did the whole law in about six years, had a great time. But it kind of kills your life when because in those days we didn’t have you know, there was no contract. You worked 90 hours a week for duty.

[00:13:47] Did you have a plan from the career perspective that you were going to be a surgeon?

[00:13:51] Yes, I but I did. The one thing I didn’t want to do after having done all of that time was I didn’t know. I didn’t you could have got away with not doing it at that point. Just about, actually. But I didn’t want to do cancer patients because they all died. And that really hurt me. I mean, despite my tough appearance, I’m actually a bit soft and I get to know these people and then we would dehumanize the hell out of them and then they die. And that really bothered me. So I kind of made this decision that I wasn’t doing my space. And the other thing that happened was I looked at the list of consultants at the time and they were six hundred of them and two were women and both were unmarried and both were miserable sods. And I thought, I don’t want to be like you. I want a family, I want a life, but I want to do my surgery, you know? So I made a choice to bring surgery into practice and do it my own way.

[00:14:50] I mean, even even surgery at practice wasn’t really done much by women time.

[00:14:55] No, not at all. I think I know. I know. Well, that’s part of the problem. And I think, you know, in those days and it’s our own fault a little bit, you know, it’s funny. Lately, women in dentistry, she’s become a real topic again. Again. Right. And I tried to almost distance myself from that because I don’t think that we we are a special case. I think if you want to do something, you get you get off your arse, you do it. And if it takes you 10 years, it takes 10 years. And it’s persistence to actually get to where you want to go. And I had listened I when I built my practice that week, I had a kid, I bought my practice and I sent my master’s exam by myself at the time. I remember getting I’m in the breast feeding my son and giving that kid to my husband and saying, can I just go in the pub for a quick bite with the boys just before I go home again? And he said, Yeah, OK, no problem. And you know what? I’ve always been one of the boys because I grew up with boys, go out with boys. There was no concern about, you know, if you’re going to do it on your own, you know what I mean? So it was tough, but it was. All right.

[00:16:10] So then let’s let’s get this out of the way right now. So the women in dentistry thing that’s come back now, do you have some sort of sympathy with why that happened?

[00:16:22] I don’t genuinely I find I think there are a lot of talented women around, but I think they’re talented because they’re talented, not because the women. So that’s one thing. I think this the one about what we’ve got kids. But I had two kids. I had two kids. I have parents to look after, to practice, to look after the education to do you know, it’s about being well organized. It’s about my moms. I was very lucky. I moved back to West London so my mom could help me help us. I also had to even though we’re divorced now, you know, my ex-husband was the most supportive, fantastic person on the planet. And frankly, any education I wanted to do, he would say, you go do it and I’ll stay home and look after the kids. So I was super lucky. So between that, my nanny and my parents, I got it done. And it was just a question of organizing. And for a while, for about three or four years, I took, took, took, took, took the whole time. And because that’s what it required. But, you know, I was just very lucky. But they were supportive 100 percent. And of course, I got in with people like Koroit with Zacky, and I’ve been friends for twenty three years. He’s one of my best mates.

[00:17:39] So at what point do you remember it’s switching from, you know, you qualified as a dentist, you did this all surgery route and bought a practice. At what point did that change to West End high end teaching and all?

[00:17:55] Ok, well, I go to the University London practice, so that was based in Gower Street anyway. So it was already in slightly Western. But when I was a kid, we used to walk up and down High Street and you’d see all the little prince, typical immigrant story. And my dad would point out all these little gold plates. And I thought to myself, if I ever get good enough, I would love to have a plate. And for me, it was about achieving being good enough, not just arriving there, because you can. So it was an important thing for me. And the reason I wanted to be there was because if you go anywhere in the world and you say that you practiced there, there is an understanding or at least a belief that some of the best people in the world practiced there, that there is this collection of knowledge and expertise. And I wanted to be at least part of something that meant something. I think certainly when I was twenty five years old, I’m not sure I feel the same way right now, but because it is a very hard task.

[00:18:58] Master the West Westend could expand on that a little bit for me. Well, there’s the obvious things, right? You haven’t got walk by traffic. Yeah.

[00:19:08] You know, you have you know, there’s no really business in the West and it’s a it’s a boys club. There’s no question about that. When I, I still get mail saying, Mr. Osborne there, it makes me laugh. Actually, the whole the whole thing makes me laugh. But when I up in practice, I had done my and restorative and I done the top, my special area was Dehradun it and I think because my parents were a bit older, certainly my dad, I was really interested in this concept that, oh, they’re old, so they really deserve dentures. Why would they want nice teeth? And that whole thing disturbed me a lot because I have treated people who are ninety six years old with implants because they say in my chair, I want to eat my steak just like you, and why shouldn’t they. And I feel really strongly about that. And I think your ability to be the best part of yourself, to look in the mirror and think I’m still here, I’m still, I’m still great, I can still eat, I can still socialise with my friends. All of those things is what keeps you living. And so I wanted to create a place that wanted to look after everyone. And the whole idea of one to one was the care that I give you one to one is custom. It’s between me and you. And so that’s how the idea came. And in fact, the one to one name came because just before my dad passed away, he gave me a sculpture with a man and a woman looking at each other. And for me that was one to one. And so I used that as my logo. And I you know, I signed my lease on the 14th of November, the year my dad passed away.

[00:20:53] You never saw it, but he knew about it. And the ethos has always been when you come in this clinic, we sit down with you and we listen to you. And we we we look and we examine I really believe in the concept of sitting down for an hour and a half trying to gather as much info as I can. And also for me, I always say to people, how can I help? You know, for me, it’s and I always say to my students, this is a. In our culture, to bow your head and serve someone is not to demean yourself, it’s like the highest form of love. And so I believe that. I really believe that. And so for me, that’s what the ethos of this clinic is about. And when I did my education, I have to say, and this is where I think it’s changed massively for women, you know, most of the time that I went to a course, most people thought I was there to make coffee or I was going to clean the premises because they actually suggested it to me a few times. And that was just how it was, you know, and the day my life changed was a damn upsetting. So I said this was my first real mentor. I mean, I was with him for 15 years, very long time. And the day I spent that day and I remember coming back out of thirty three Harley Street and opening the front door, the sun was shining and I walked out into the street and I thought, now I know what I’m going to do. So that was my one of my moments of grace, I think.

[00:22:25] Do you see the kind of person to rise out of the witness, you know, like the next person when they thought when they heard that overheard the person in the corridor saying, I’m not giving the job to her, would have melted under or you felt you like you enjoy being mistaken for the cleaner because you’re going to teach them what is known.

[00:22:49] But I think when I was younger, you get used to being you get used to people expecting a little bit. And in my family, it was totally the opposite. My father was very pro women. I’m a Muslim girl. And he he expected more from me than even said to the boys, No, it’s not that I find that quite sad. I find it sad that people don’t have good expectations of you, you know, and I think that’s something I’ve tried to change when I teach because I really, really believe that anybody can be taught anything. And I think that teaching is about the acquisition of skills. It’s about change. And I really think if you believe in something, anything’s possible. And I was and that’s what my parents gave us. They gave us that belief. And it’s not so much the I I respect it. I certainly when I was younger, I expected it and I got it. And I just thought, OK, here we go. Here we go again.

[00:23:47] Does that drive you and motivate you? Does it does it make you think, you know what that person thinks I’m the lady. This person is not going to give me the job. I’ll show. And that give you more drive.

[00:24:00] Yeah, it does. It did at the time. Without question. I definitely had a much more feisty I think it mellow with age. I definitely had a much more feisty. Well, you put the barrier down. You know, I’m I’m a great believer. When people talk to me about barriers, I say to them that barriers in reality and the barriers in your head and I think more barriers of it sometimes than reality. And I am a person that if I want to do something, I’m either going through it, around it or over it, but I’m not going to go under it. And I fall down all the time. I fall down all the time. But the thing is, I am surrounded by a family that loved me. Come what may. They are unconditionally at my side. I’m supported in by my friends. You know, I said about even Asher and I have friends I’ve had for thirty years. And even when I fell down in the sense that I don’t know whether you will bring this up, so I’ll bring it up. When I got my letter right, that was four years of hell. Hell, because you suddenly feel that everything has been swept from under you and you suddenly start to believe that you’ve done something terrible. You’ve really that you’ve hurt someone. And it’s appalling. And I remember Corey and Zachy coming to my practice of the day and they sat down and read the letter and said, write, what are we going to do? And it was always we it was always the Three Musketeers, you know. And and I and I hugely remember Corey saying, if they come for you, they’ll come for me, too. And so I was always really lucky because loyalty to my friends is any of my friends call me anytime of the day or night. I will get in my car or walk there if I have to to get to them, because that’s what friendship means to me. And I think that’s why I’ve survived this long, really fiscella.

[00:26:03] Tell me about your patient experience, because from what I’m hearing right now, your whole life and everything is about loyalty, love, care and all of that. And so how do you how do you wrap that up in your in your patient experience? It seems to me you’re less of a businesswoman and more of someone. Is that, as you mentioned, to serve to give that ninety six year old the ability to bite into a steak for the first time in 20, 30 years solely through your patient experience, what happens? A walk through the door? Who do I meet if I pick up the phone? Who do I speak to? What is the experience like in your clinic?

[00:26:41] So usually a lot of my work is referrals, so it’s not the referral from in-house patients. So I think that’s a big plus for us and also a lot of my students and work. But although we’re doing that work together a lot of the time or is just direct referrals. So for example, I have referrals from each other and of the people in the area that I work with. So they will ring and we will have normally had a letter before. So we’ll be aware some white front of House will know straight away that someone’s called and they will be welcomed and say, yes, we’ve got the referral. We’re going to send you an email. Would you like to send us back to your availability? And we would normally say to them, we’ll call you by the end of today to get this sorted for you. Then they’ll come to me and show me that. And if I don’t know about it already, we’ll try to find the appropriate time. So, for example, if the patient is 90, I’m not going to offer them a nine o’clock appointment. I’m going to offer them at 11:00 to do a fourth appointment because they’re not going to get out of bed at 7:00. So things like that I’m fairly attuned to then depending on what it is, they will be called by my head nurse who looks after my patients and she will get to know them. She will ask them if there’s anything they’re particularly concerned about. She’ll ask them how they’re getting to us, you know, just in case there’s any delays, all that kind of thing. And then she’ll follow up on an email saying, I’ll call you the day before your appointment. If you have any concerns, please contact me before.

[00:28:14] So that happens when you walk in. We’re ready. We know you’re coming. So my head nurse will welcome you three covid. We would have known. We will have you a cup of coffee, whatever you want. You will sit down and then they’ll tell me straight away and I will go to to the waiting room or the waiting area and pick up the patient myself. I’ll then take them through and we sit in like a little coffee an area and sit down and have a chat. So the first thing I do with my patient in that scenario is to sit down and learn something about them, learn what makes them tick, why they’re there, what their experience has been, what worries them, what makes them happy. What they’re concerned about today is that away from the dental chair? Yeah. So we have a couple of armchairs. We have a coffee table, that kind of thing. Very simple. They might have a cup of coffee still in their hand. And then we’ll move towards the dental chair and I’ll say to them, this is what I’d like to achieve in the next forty five minutes. We’re going to go through it in this way so they know exactly what’s going to happen before we move to the chair and then we get to the chair. So I will do a full exam photographs. I tend to ask them what are the three or four things that they want to achieve? And I write them down in their own words. And I say to the if you decide that I’m the person who’s going to help you, we’re going to come back and look at this at the end when I fit. So I know whether I did this right.

[00:29:43] You look at just what’s really important about what you just said there is. You’ll know this payment because there’s so many people on Facebook who will advise you during a consultation to say, you know, you’ve just said if you decide that you’re the right way, I’m the right person for you, which is far more humble than some of the advice put out there, which they say, if I think you’re the right patient today and I decide. And so that puts that idea of scarcity in the patient to make them more likely to convert. Yeah. Or as you’ve just flipped that on its head and actually put the choice in the patient’s hands.

[00:30:25] Well, I think it is their choice. I think it’s also our choice. Yeah. I think, you know, if I feel and I’m I’m wrong sometimes about this, but I feel that most of the time I have some connection to people. And I think you have to have an alignment or a connection with the person you’re going to serve in that way, because it’s going to take 12 months sometimes. And it’s not just about the technical. Let’s get through the technical bit of the work that you’re doing. My area is is full mastery, but I don’t do all I’m for. I tend to do all on eight. So I’m actually trying to do the bone grafting of the gum grafting and put everything back so I don’t make units bigger than three. The biggest unit I’ve got is a three unit bridge. So I’m actually spending a lot of time, maybe 12, 18 months doing this. But make and the other thing I don’t do is I don’t do dentures ever. So for me, adventure is like in my hand of. Do you immediately load about 90 percent of what I do is immediately like, yeah, so obviously we have all the fancy stuff now with all the planning, the digital planning. We’ve got a lab here now and all of that and all the city and all of that. But for me, I want the technical side of things to be behind the patient care. And for me, that’s really important. I don’t want the patients, so I’m just going to have a impulsivity. I want them to feel that they’re coming here and we’re going to change one set of teeth to work for another set of teeth to do. And that’s a real responsibility because you can’t really afford to get that wrong, not to mention the financial investment they’re making. But it’s the fact that once you’ve taken all that away, you can’t put it back if you like. So you have to take that really seriously.

[00:32:13] What I find about the whole teeth in a day process procedure, out of all the treatments that we provide in our own clinic is the one that has, I would say, the biggest life impact. Absolutely. Above and beyond that is cosmetic dentistry, teeth whitening, even payment and orthodontics. Right. Is that you’re actually giving these patients back, Cruickshank’s and yeah. The ability to not worry about something falling out of their mouth. Absolutely. Or just a whole new menu of food, right? Yeah. Have you got any stories you can share with those of patients whose lives have changed? And what is the one that sticks out that’s had the biggest impact on you?

[00:33:00] I remember the first one I did, the first one I did was a lady who came and everything was moving to the point where she brought her models and said, you can’t take an impression because everything will come out. So I was already shit scared about what I was going to be doing if I was going to be doing it. So. So that was a big thing. And she was only sixty seven. So for me that wasn’t that old. And I sat down and I remember saying to her, and I’ve done lots of versions of this a lot, but I’d never actually done it all in one go. And I always made sure I surrounded myself with people that were a bit better or a lot better. So that wasn’t very difficult. And I made sure and I said to her, OK, so we used these two models, which were OK, and we kind of guesstimated what we were going to do. And I had everybody there on the day and I knew I could do the surgery. And my ex-husband was a prosthodontics, so I knew I had him as a backup. And he we did this as a double act for nearly two years.

[00:34:01] And at the end of it and I’m not joking, have we finished a 10 to one in the morning? It was about ten hours apart. A whole lot. And I remember her daughter coming to get her and everything was fine. I did it under sedation, so everything was cool. She went home and the next day she sent me a photo of her eating and she said, today is the beginning of the rest of my life. And I still have the photo and I still have the text to remind me of how fallible I am and how, yes, this can go well, but how lucky I am and how grateful I am to be surrounded by all those people to pick me up. And they do. They operate for eight hours is no joke. And I was really lucky. And I and I said to myself, I’m going to do five hundred and then I’m going to go and I’ve done five hundred and three. But but I also decided the last one I’m going to do for free because that would be my best one. Nice.

[00:35:06] Do you remember your first implant fame if.

[00:35:08] Oh yeah. I’ll tell you something, it’s funny, we were talking about it yesterday. I have it in my drawer because I do have it to look at. So every time I open the door, the surgery is looking at me. Yeah, it happened after 18 months. And I remember saying to me, I’m so glad because I was beginning to worry that you’d think they weren’t. Yeah. I remember every single day, every time I pick up an infant, I remember that you’re only as good as the last one. Really? Really. And, you know, I learned a lot from that. And I don’t worry that the implants will fail because after twenty six years later, you know what to do, because you’ve actually made all the mistakes and you’ve mostly made all the corrections. So by now, you should you should know something.

[00:35:58] If we ask if you want to say this question about mistakes. Because from from I don’t know if you’ve seen black black box thinking. Yeah, yeah. It’s about it’s about we can learn from mistakes and how in medicine we don’t sort of learn from our mistakes. What we don’t learn from each other’s mistakes because everyone hides their mistakes.

[00:36:20] If you had to think back, what would you say is your biggest mistake and what have you learned from it?

[00:36:25] My first big mistake was I was doing a placement with an oral surgeon, actually, and she put this implant in and I said, is it sound? And I wiggled it and it went into sinus. All right. And I remember thinking, holy bleep, what am I going to do now? And so my choice was right. Well, let’s go back to oral surgeon, open it up. We take it out. I remember saying to us that when it happened to him that you’re fishing around in this sinus doing this Cordella procedure, you’re fishing around. And then he literally set up the patient and the implant fell out onto the floor. And I remember thinking, yeah, OK, so after an hour of fishing around, I suddenly wised up and I said to the patient, can we just sit you up for a sec? And it fell on the floor. And in that moment, I literally looked up at the sky at the window and said, thank you so much. So there’s that. I’ve learnt a lot from that. I think putting implants in the wrong place, I think almost every kind of mistake you can imagine, nothing life threatening, nothing major, but every kind of thing that is not perfect.

[00:37:40] I have at least done once, if not more than that. And I think the difference is that when I go to surgery now, I don’t go with a plan. I go with 10 plans. So I always assume, well, if it goes to plan, we don’t need to talk about it and nobody does. You don’t learn anything either. But if it doesn’t go to plan, what are you going to do? What happens if this happens and this happens and this happens? And if I’m nervous, I will have spoken to cry about it or I will have spoken to six or seven of my colleagues and we have a club for failures. You can’t bring successes to this club. You only bring failures. And that is the best seminar we have. And there’s only four of us. But we bring the failures because we’ve all got the two, three cases that if you touch it, it goes wrong. And I still have a couple of those.

[00:38:30] Yeah, I mean, it’s it’s nice. It’s become much more fashionable to talk about in lectures. So you’ve been surrounded by some of the you know, the great looks at the flea and Koroit. What would you say? We just we just did a podcast with Paul Polman. Yeah. And the question of does it take to be a great implant surgeon because it’s not about drilling the hole, is it?

[00:38:57] No, it’s about knowing where to drill it. No. For me, the people my mentors are people like the two people you’ve mentioned, but also how Goodman, the Christian I went abroad and the thing that I learned the most was plan, plan, plan, collect as much information plan. Listen, go back, check it again and try to get some skills. You know, what I find hard is that you tend to sell what you do. And the problem is that if you when you’re younger, you’ve only got a few skills. So you’re trying to push those. And I keep saying to my students, life is this tool box of us every month, get a skill, get a tip, get a break and put it in there, because you might not use it more than once a year, but at least it’s in there. And I think for me, I have been on every major course going. I’m still learning. I’m still excited about what I don’t know, although it can be frustrating. But I find it for me it’s about trying to learn what I don’t know so I can do more and do better because I can always do better.

[00:40:07] So typically, this patient that you mentioned, the one that the new patient comes in my referral, let’s call it a full mouth rehab, how much time is spent away from that patient planning the case?

[00:40:20] If it’s a full full, I’ll spend an hour to one and a half hour sessions with them and then I’ll spend probably four or five hours writing the treatment plan and another three or four hours planning on the scan with the lab. Looking at the the stuff that comes is probably a good 15 hours of work before you get to the surgery.

[00:40:39] Well, easily. And the process of presenting your plan to the patient. Yes. They construe that by now we’ve got a lot of rapport. Yeah. No way we’re all going. Yeah, but I take it your prices are on the upper end.

[00:40:57] I think I’m in the middle. I remember once somebody said I was the most reasonable dentist in Piss Me Off that way.

[00:41:04] But I mean, I guess sometimes it runs to tens of thousands of pounds.

[00:41:08] I mean, a full month rehab is is definitely in the in the rebate of 50 plus years.

[00:41:14] So you’ve got to break that news to the patients because. Sixty thousand pound plan take us through it and the follow up process as well. I mean, so everyone’s straight away.

[00:41:25] No, but the thing is, when I do my consultation, the first one we measure, how many people come I don’t have 20 consults a month. I have three or four. So when you sit with me, there’s a good chance you want to be there. I’m not as expensive as Karibe, but, you know, I charge two fifty three hundred quid to sit in my chair. And it’s really for me to listen to what you want, what you want and also what you think you need. We’re very good at telling people what they need, and I’m not one of those people. I remember somebody saying people buy what they want, not what you tell them they need. So I’m very mindful of that. I sit down and I also learned a long time ago that people hold this notion of what they want in their heads for five days. And after that they’re off somewhere else, buying a car, buying a diamond, whatever it is. So we have a rule in the clinic, certainly for me, that when I see a consult from implant dentistry, you get by email and post a full treatment plan within five days, you’re then invited to come and talk to me. If it’s a simple single, most people will do that, but they will come to consult to do the rest of the investigations and then we would go to surgery.

[00:42:40] And if they need to see the therapist or the hygienist or or if they need to have a workup, some of the boys that I work with, they will I will segment the case into if they need. We can work that I do right now. I will send it to Tomko for Clark or somebody like that who’s been in my practice, and he will do all of that.

[00:42:58] They’ll remove all the carries the build the tools and we will set up the occlusal scag because that patient is having a fixed provision or whether it’s a rocket or whatever it is, even if they had a dentist to start with, because I find it a bit crazy that you’re selling this. And if it is not was 50 quid, we wouldn’t be talking about it by the crew. So you’re selling the most expensive thing in dentistry and you’re taking it to thousand and the first thing you do is put a disgusting flipper in their mouth. Well, what I what a great guy. What a great girl you are. So for me, that is the work you have just dehumanised that person. So for me, I would say to my students, if you do that, please let me know and please don’t ever come back, because it is the exact opposite of what I’m about. So the patient will come, we’ll talk it through at the end of the first ponza. I say to the patient, you have two decisions to make. One, are we doing this together? And two, how are we going to pay for it? And they are two distinct decisions. And in a sense, it’s like the jargony word is the call to action, if you like. So then I repeat that in my email and I say to them, if you want to do this, but you haven’t worked, it might be finance, it might be stage payments, it might be some of it’s on the course. Some of it is there are lots of ways to skin the cat. But if you decided that we are the people who you want to help you, then we can help you with the other side as well. And that’s really important to me. I don’t want to treat people who just have a stack of cash in the boot. I want to treat people who we’re going to make a difference to.

[00:44:40] But you tell the guy fifty thousand pounds, I bet you get a few shocked people, right?

[00:44:45] Yeah. But to be honest, maybe years ago. But I think nowadays people who are at the terminal dentition stage and they do not want dentures. And to be honest, I don’t have a single dental care in my practice because our practice demographic is from 18 to about, well, ninety six. But the point is the majority of people are within working age. So I’m going to get the middle ranking.

[00:45:11] I used to get a lot of everyday people that have just saved up and you just feel a huge responsibility for taking their savings, you know, so they know it’s going to be a fair amount. The one thing about media nowadays, find out whatever you want to find out so they know this already if they’re being referred. And a lot of my work is referred to the person. It’s a warm leave, isn’t it? Because the person sending Bulatovic.

[00:45:39] Tell me about the practice and you said you mentioned Tomko footlong. Yeah. How many associates are there? What’s the setup?

[00:45:46] Well, I don’t do associates, you know, so I kind of do I’m a pretend associate. So what I like to do, what I’ve always wanted to do is for each one of these guys to have their own little practice. OK, so they do do some associate work for me, but each one of them has their own bank of patients that belongs to them.

[00:46:10] So they rent the space, they take their own money, they do their own shit. And slowly over the time they are building their own little practices. And we essentially they pay a flat rate because obviously they’re young and they and they want to keep their expenses down. And I send the work on an associate 50 50 basis as well.

[00:46:29] But each one of them has their own little practice. And the idea is that eventually, hopefully three or four of them will get together and they’ll do it together as an expense share, but they’ll take their own money, have their own independence, have their own philosophy. But they will also have an ethos that is together. So how many of them are that? There’s four of them. And and obviously I have a therapist as well who looks after all of us. So so they all do a day, two days, three days. That is a full surgery practice. And they have gone through all of the courses that I’ve done. So I’ve kind of picked them based on I haven’t just picked on skill, actually. I’ve picked on that headspace, how kind they are, how honest they are, because I think if you have the right person, you know, me and Alphons are pretty cool friends. I love the guys. I love the way he does things. I believe in the same thing as he does. I think if you pick the right person, you can change anything. So same thing.

[00:47:31] A lot of time for our fans of such a lovely guy. And tell me about the vibe if you practice, Fazeela, what’s it like when you go there in terms of just the environment, the general buzz, the feel that you get when you walk in there with your team?

[00:47:47] Laughter I’m saying to the girls today, we love too much. There’s always we we were family. We’re not that big. Everybody’s part time except me. We look out for each other. We know what’s going on in each other’s lives. We care about each other. We also believe work is work. So when that switch flips, it’s time to put your game face on, you know? But the other thing is, I’ve been looking after probably 70 percent of my patients for at least 20 plus years. So they’re friends now. They’re people that we very sociable with quite often before pandemic. If a patient had said, oh, I’m not going to my husband’s not picking me up for another hour, I said, what? Don’t you pop upstairs with me, sit down and have a cup of coffee, have a chat. You know, it’s a very sociable place. It’s a very warm place. It’s very Western kind of feel. I love that vibe. There’s always fruit on the table. There’s always food in the fridge. You know, on a Friday night, we sit down. Even now, we try to have our practice meetings around, you know, an Indian takeout round, the one on the conference table. And I think I would like that family. I hope the big family I had at home, I brought to work. So from that point of view, it’s a warm, happy place. I’m not saying we don’t have moments when we’re I’m a grumpy soldier or somebody else else’s, but by and large, people are really great at their jobs. They love what they do. They believe in what they do. And I’m really proud of them.

[00:49:18] Sort so bossy. You so imagine. Well, first of all, what sort of bossy you when when you need to sort of batten down the hatches and tell someone they’ve done something wrong or really straight talking pain in the ass, you know?

[00:49:33] Well, if somebody comes to me, it depends on the mood. But I’m a very kind, caring person. If you need me, I’ll be there and I will help you. If you come and say it and say to me, can we have a coffee? And I sit down with you and I say, what’s the problem? I’m really don’t. OK, let’s do it. Let’s do it again. And I will be there and I will help and all the rest of it. But I’m also the person if I’m really stressed about something. Yeah, I’ll have a little swear occasionally. And I think I’m, I’m not tough, but I’m very straight talking. I don’t get what you say. Yeah. What you see is what you get and I don’t change. And the thing is but when I’ve said it, I’ve said it. I’m not somebody who doesn’t talk to you for days and all that kind of nonsense. I’ll say it and I’ll go. Are we good? Yeah, right. Should put the kettle on then. That’s kind of who I am. Mood everybody makes mistakes.

[00:50:30] What about your teaching? So you teach them on the course. Does that Crucell going with and.

[00:50:37] We suspended it. We did a couple of years, part of the reason we did that course was that we kind of grew up in an industry together and we actually wanted to share what we knew. So we did a couple of years and I was still at the royal colleges that as the lead to to. Yes, it. Yeah. And I had it. I’m not anymore. But I had a gig. I was associate professor at Stony Brook, so I had a gig there and I was just traveling a lot. And I was also running my own year courses, my own advanced courses for when I go. Yeah. So I’ve got a connection with how equipment in South Africa. I’ve got one question in Romania and all the rest of it. And so what I decided in the pandemic was to bring it all together under one umbrella and to just open it up. So now we’ve got an 18 month program which allows you to say diploma. We cover the curriculum, but we’ve got speakers and tutors. So the guys who have been through the course, taking the time and now tutors and they look after the general practices that come in and obviously the speakers like each other come and speak. And Alphons is one of my speakers as well, actually. But but what I wanted to do with the education is I wanted to create a place where people, young people could come see you in town and you got an hour to kill and you just want to come in almost like a like in the old common room school, you know, and you come in, make a coffee, sit down, somebody looking at a case and you just take part and it’s an open door policy and it’s a place where you can feel at home and welcome. And there’s always something going on. And the ones who are slightly older are teaching, the ones that are slightly younger, that kind of thing. And we’re doing that. We’re doing that. And we’re loving it, actually.

[00:52:24] And I just want to touch upon you, really, Fazeela and just sort of you mentioned ex husband. You happy to talk about that and.

[00:52:35] Oh yeah, he’s one of my best friends, actually. So I was married to a Welshman called David Osborne, who’s a senior lecturer at the Royal London and Restorative kind of came about a couple of weeks before I graduated and left. So when I came back, he was there and we eventually got married 18 months later. So he was still teaching in hospital, partly in practice. We had a couple of kids. And, you know, I think the stresses of life, we bought a free held in holosuite, bought 50 to that, nearly killed us. I’ve lived in Harley Street for about eight years. And I think, you know, I really knew where I wanted to go. And he was incredibly supportive. And I think maybe sometimes I wonder if I’m pushy. When I’m ready to go, I’m going, you know? And I think it was just the tough it was a tough we went through. So, you know, 2010 was a great recession even before that. And we ended up thinking that we were better separate than we were together. But we had one thing in common, other than the fact that we were both decent people.

[00:53:46] I was very, very lucky in that we both absolutely adored our children and we didn’t want to hurt them. So we had a very amicable divorce. I mean, obviously there were days where we wanted to kill each other, but very few. And even to this day, our kids say we didn’t really feel like you were divorced because you were just so nice to each other. And I worked with David three or four years after we were divorced because I’d worked with him all the way through before. So I was very fortunate. And I have happy children. And even though David is in Singapore, remarried to a very nice lady, you know, he is one person. If I needed some advice, if I was selling tomorrow and I wanted a really straight up, loyal, decent guy to give me a really good opinion, he would be the one I would go to. Mason. How old are your kids, Fazil? My daughter is twenty three to be twenty four this year and my son is twenty two this year.

[00:54:49] To either of them. Look at dentistry to be daft.

[00:54:52] One of them is, one of them is an architect in the making. So she’s going back to Cambridge to do her master’s in real estate, finance and architecture. So she’s fine, she’s fine if you like, of that seven, eight year road. And my son went into the family business of politics, philosophy and law. So so. Yeah. So I did one go to Cambridge and one go to Oxford, know what he’s thinking about going to do. His master’s there, but he went to work and he’s now in Austria this year just doing philosophy. He’s another one that wants to bring all the animals home and mend them. But I think he wants to do that with humans. So yeah.

[00:55:34] Did you guys not one of them to be a dentist?

[00:55:36] No, we didn’t. You know what we did? We kind of said when they’re ready for the career, we’ll open the door and have the chat with them. And they came to us and said, we want to do this. So we said, fine, off you go. And we basically said our job was to open all the opportunities to them and let them decide. But I can’t say I wouldn’t. I think dentistry is really amazing and exciting in twenty, twenty one, but really hard. I think the people, the the generation, the are the social media generation are much faster with each other than my generation was. You know, I’m fifty five years old. If I don’t like someone I just don’t go to the pub with them. It’s really simple. I feel the need to slag everywhere that I can find. And I think that harshness and the lack of grace is something that I’m glad that my kids would never be part of in my profession. And it’s this I’m better than you syndrome that I find really hard. And I say to the I treat the guys on my courses, the guys and the girls, they’re all twenty five to thirty five or even older. And I just say to them, you know, if everyone makes a mistake, everybody has got skills and everybody is learning skills and we need to be a bit kinder to each other.

[00:57:00] I think physically, you know, sometimes under the guise of what’s best for the patient, we can be quite cruel to each other. Yeah. And it’s it’s one of those things. It’s almost like you have licence when you’re talking about the patient. You’ve got licence to be cruel to each other. And and I see that quite a lot, you know, at the same time. Do you think Forstchen. The reason that they’ve been brought up on social media got massive advantages over huge.

[00:57:31] Yeah, but you know what I find, you know, for me, I would much rather pick up the phone and have a conversation with you about the fact that it saves all the twenty seven texts. And I’m Tony and you and you misunderstand me. And then we fall at the end of it anyway, whereas you pick up the phone and get what I mean is this and that’s the end of that conversation. So for me, what I find sad is it feels sometimes like the art of conversation is going all right. And I have to say, we grew up, especially on a Friday night, where we all sat around the table together. I lived with five boys through uni. Half of them would come home to mum and dad and we’d sit there, eat endless amounts of food, having a whisky and a cigar at the end of the night and just put it in the whole world to write, you know, that that conversation, that banter. And we still have it in the practice. But that notion of why don’t we just have a conversation? And in fact, when people come to me and say, how is it you get the conversion on your consults? And I say to the just have a channel for me when I consult a patient, if they buy, they buy. If they don’t, they don’t.

[00:58:42] I’m just having a conversation like I don’t know why, but I get the feeling I want to come to a party hosted by you. Why? I just feel like you’re one of those hostess with the most this kind of I love the food will definitely be good.

[00:59:00] You know, I’m not crazy, but I get on the summer. But you know what? There’s only like one or two things I really do. Well, everything else I just try hard. But, you know, I think. Well, you must kind. Thank you. Know what my dinner parties are like. You come, you have loads to drink at the beginning. We have really lovely food. And then I put some lovely Spotify and start singing or gets his guitar. That’s it. That’s what happens.

[00:59:32] It’s all downhill from there because I wanted to touch base on you if you were speaking about your dad in the sculpture earlier. Yeah. You mentioned to me before this podcast that your mom passed away not too long ago. Tell us a little bit about your mom and the daily conversations you used to have to have with you. Say your routine would be at some point during the day she was on speed dial, right?

[00:59:59] Yeah, always. You know what I loved about her? I wish I was anything like as like my dad, but crazy. She was calm and cool. And when she had something to say, you didn’t speak. But her entire life was her family, even though she was a very, very well respected senior lawyer. But she found the humor in everything. So if I was going out for dinner with anybody, I would get on the phone. I said, I’m going to need to tell you I’m not ringing you, but we’re going here and we’re going we’re going to do that. She knew everybody. She knew all my friends because she always encouraged us to bring our friends home. She always said, show me show me your company and I’ll tell you who you are. You know, it’s really old fashioned, but it is what it is. We had a bar in our house and, you know, my parents were you want to you want to have your your your cocktails till 3:00 in the morning. No problem at all of you come in the garden, whatever. And we’re just off to bed.

[01:00:50] So I was really lucky that I didn’t have to hide. I didn’t have to be the girl that had to put her face on in the in the bathroom before I went to school. I could do that at home. You know, I was very lucky. But my mom was the glue. She was the one who showed us how to love and and she loved us every single day. And she was our best friend. And she loved to laugh with us and at us at all the silly things we did. And now we miss we I miss her every day. I miss my dad every day. And with mom, it’s food. So even yesterday I said to my daughter, yes, let’s just cook that one thing that mom did. And, you know, we remember her story thinking about her every day and and just remembering the humor. But it’s something that is still very, very it’ll be there at my father’s been dead twenty years. It’s the first person I think of when I wake up in the morning. It is just one of those things.

[01:01:52] I’m fortunate not to be in that position. Right. But I know Songe lost both his parents. Yes. I mean, you were saying that it almost felt like the ground from under his feet disappeared, right. When when you’ve got that support, as you spoke to it, spoke about it like glue.

[01:02:10] And how did you cope initially when?

[01:02:14] Well, with mom, it was really difficult because she came home to pass away, you know, this old West Indian. And it’s not even. What’s the old saying? My mom was like.

[01:02:23] Four years old, she wanted to die at home and we managed to do that, and it was all of us, the grandchildren, everything. And I thought to myself, you just passed away, passed on with everybody that’s nearest and dearest, close to you, who love you quietly, not in pain. And we will remember you every single day. It was hard. It was hell, because both funnily enough, both my parents died on the same day, 17 years apart, which is weird. And they were buried on Christmas Eve. So Christmas is a tough time for us, but now that it’s getting less painful. I choose to you know, I’m I have both my parents photos of my surgery and my patients always say we’ve got the level they like here. And I say that’s to protect me against you. And we have a bit of a laugh about that. But is it cute because it makes you face your own mortality? Yeah, it does. And it’s a very good question that you ask that, because when your parents passed away, certainly for me, you suddenly feel like that golden cloak isn’t there anymore and you’re kind of on your own, even though I’m not on my own. And you will next year, the next generation. So even though I’m fifty five, I’m not seventy five. You think hang on a minute. I’m going to make the next X number of years count. So you start to. It’s not so much the exiting but is what am I going to do in the next five years because I don’t really want to do much more than that. I want to go back to it is a walk on the beach every day. But what am I going to do that’s going to make the last five years be the best five years in your life? So it does make you a bit nervous, but I’m not frightened in the middle of my career.

[01:04:12] It’s not something that I particularly talk about, but it’s not a secret either. I was very, very ill. I had a very good cancer when I was thirty eight and I lost two children and went through 12 years of surgeries and chemo and and a lot of people didn’t know. I just got on with it. And you know, it was quite nice just getting on with it. But when I needed them they were there and and my kids were there particularly. So I know what it’s like to wonder if I’m going to survive because they gave me three and I go, I’m already 13. And so, you know, I’m going to die when I’m good and ready.

[01:04:47] But again, a little bit of bloody mindedness. Yeah, I’m not ready. I’ve got still things I don’t want to do. But it does make you think every day is going to count, even if it’s just to have a coffee with a man.

[01:05:03] So what are you thinking for the next five years?

[01:05:06] Well, I want to grow this education thing that’s been going on for twenty odd years into something solid. So finally, I’ve put it into a company and I’m going to I would like the course to be less about me and more about them, more about the boys that are going to be the payments, Barney’s and the Toms and the Scott Phillips and all those guys trip and all the people that are going to take it forward. And, you know, I want to leave it to them. I want to leave that to them so that they can look after it and carry it. I want to do my best five years. I want to learn all the things I still can’t do and be a bit better. And I want to spend I promised myself before lockdown that I would work for six weeks and go home to or work for eight to go home for three. And it hasn’t happened because of this. But I’m definitely going to do that. I’m going to take the time to look at the way some more and to trek some more and to spend the time with the people that are getting old, because I don’t want to be that guy who says I wish I had because a lot of my family were in the seventies and I want to be there to live with the because dentistry can wait, you know, and the young ones can do it. And, you know, I want to have more balance in that sense.

[01:06:30] What would you do if you had half a day to yourself would be Fazeela? Sort of?

[01:06:36] Well, it depends who I could do it with. If I had the kids, we’d probably go for a really cool breakfast and then go for a long walk in Box Hill and just chat away. You live around there? No, but we go there quite often. I live in I live in music. Oh, well, we it depends. If I was in the Caribbean, it would be a different thing, but I would spend it with people I love. I would cook if it was not an activity, I would or I’d be on a horse somewhere or something like that. They would always be food around. But for me, life is people. Life is my family, my friends and the people I work with predominantly.

[01:07:19] Fazeela, that sort of takes us on too nicely on Suazo. Final question. Going back to what your mom and dad passed on to you, the sculpture and the daily conversations with mom. I imagine it’s your last day on the planet and you’ve got your kids around you. What would be the things that you pass on to them? Three pieces of advice that you’d want to leave them with the equivalent of the sculpture or whatever it is. What would you say to them?

[01:07:56] I would say to my kids, don’t forget where we come from so that you know where you’re going. That’s really important to me that we keep our food and our culture and all the things that glue us together from the from the elders to the to the next, I think I would say in everything you do look for a win win. Don’t do deals of any kind where someone has to lose, look for a win because it’s a much better deal. It makes you sleep at night. And the final thing is live every day, live every day as if it’s your last laugh, cry, love, do whatever you do and do it really well. And if you mess up when you put your head on your pillow, tomorrow is a better day. Always. It’s just simple stuff, you know, simple stuff. Look out for each other and be true to what you believe in, you know. And if it doesn’t work, if people don’t like that, well, keep quiet about it then.

[01:08:56] And if you could finish the following sentence and the topic is legacy write Fazila was dot, dot, dot a crazy, but he was kind, tough, loyal, persistent.

[01:09:15] And who never gave up?

[01:09:17] If I don’t to want a more positive one, imagine you’ve got a month left. Oh.

[01:09:25] Are you going to do your time, I would pretty much give up work if I had a month, I do a week of work. You lost three case, yeah. Yep. I can’t finish at the month.

[01:09:39] I do as much as I could do a week of work if you had a month.

[01:09:43] Yeah, I do a week of work. I love. I love. I love knowing the. Somewhere down the line, it might make a difference or might help. I know that sounds a bit. It sounds a bit highfalutin, but it’s not so I do a do a few days at work, I would try to I have a bucket list of one hundred and fourteen things. I’ve only got 12 left. So what do they want it? I can’t tell you that it was everything from. I still have to do Machu Picchu. I haven’t done that. It’s simple stuff. It’s like I have a walk on Nelson Mandela did that, you know, simple things. I would spend most of it with my kids in the bush in Guyana, in the Amazon, trekking for at least two weeks. And then I’d probably have my five favorite foods in the world and just chill with the people I love. I won’t do anything too fancy for me.

[01:10:42] That’s fancy, will you? Five favorite foods. Well, you probably should. Did you what’s your final meal? Yes, just to keep things really positive.

[01:10:56] Curry the execution meal from Kenya. I want to bring and aubergine curry with some callaloo which is like a spinach and some roti and some doel. Nice. Nice.

[01:11:13] It’s been absolutely lovely. Oh, it’s been a joy to continue. I really enjoyed it.

[01:11:17] Yeah, me too. I really, really enjoyed that. And I think the thanks a lot for being so open. Really well.

[01:11:25] I’ll probably come across as a lunatic, but it is really enjoyable when you are in the West then. I have listened to a few of them actually. And you know, I trained Sanjay and I, Sanjay and I, I taught Sanjay on his first the kidney. So I know I know Nick. I know them. All right. That’s the problem. We’ve been around so long and we eat again. That’s what we did.

[01:11:54] So whenever you’re in the in the West End number eight, the door’s always open.

[01:11:58] Thank you for food.

[01:12:02] It’s been lovely to see. Definitely. Definitely. Thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it.

[01:12:09] Thank you for doing this. Acento leaders the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging leaders and dentistry.

[01:12:23] Your house payment, then Groody and perhaps Celenk. 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 got some value out of it if you did get some value out of it.

[01:12:44] Think about subscribing and if you would share this with a friend who you think might get some value out of it, too. Thank you so, so, so much for listening. Thanks. And don’t forget our six star rating.

Dental Leaders – Paul Palmer.mp3

[00:00:00] We always try and not treat patients to a budget. So if it means not treating a patient, I know it sounds mean, but we’d rather not treat a patient than try and treat them on the cheap.

[00:00:17] This is Dental Leaders, the podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging leaders in dentistry. Your hosts Paymen Langroudi and Prav Solanki, it gives me great pleasure to welcome Paul Palmer onto the podcast.

[00:00:40] Paul is a consultant periodontist from Guys Hospital, works in the West and has many papers and a book on employment policy and works in the South End practice. Pleasure to have you, Paul.

[00:00:58] Thank you very much. Nice to be on this podcast.

[00:01:01] It’s about kind of the person behind the persona. And we kind of we tend to start with the same question and end with the same question. So the first question always is, where were you born? How do you sort of grow up? What kind of childhood did you have?

[00:01:15] When did dentistry come onto your agenda? OK, so that’s what leads to her. You actually confused me with my brother in a setting up of the expected third year and one of a family of five boys, and our father was a furrier. Grandmother was in the fur trade as well. So a lot of my extended family were in the fur trade, which is obviously quite a high, highly technical manual job. Now, that’s partly where we go now, dexterity from so two my brothers, when it’s the fur trade we’re actually dying and they went on to other things. So one of them became a paramedic, another one which I went into a sale loft because we’re sort of major family sporting activity growing up with society. And then one, the middle one’s an accountant. And then so my eldest brother, Richard, who is a twin, he had the closest relationship and the five of us. So we were very close, all my three brothers, nine years between us. So he had a big influence on my choices, I suppose. So the classic story I tell is where my teacher at the age of nine asked me what I wanted to be and I was proud when I got home to tell my mother I’d had this conversation. And the answer I gave is all I want to be a gynaecologist. And she just basically just raised your eyebrows and just sort of took it as why would that be a surprise when he’s got four older brothers just influencing him.

[00:02:53] And so they had a massive influence. You know, when you got brothers who were that much older than you, they influence you. But then it’s always had a sort of medical balance, I suppose. But medicine saved a bit of a a far stretch. So rich nobody I who went to grammar school after eleven plus our middle brother joined us. So I went to grammar school on the same day he went to sixth form and I went into the first one. Did you grow up in Essex? Yeah. So we’re all born and bred in Essex by three of us live in our own lives and cultures. London, so by the time I was of deciding what to do, Richard was already just about to qualify as a dentist. And so then when I was at school, I nursed him a couple of times when you say periodontal surgery. So he started the practice we’re in now that started on Saturday mornings in our small surgery a mile away from me now. Well, what year did you start, though? So he started that a little bit, about nineteen seventy seven, something like that. Well, that’s that’s the one you just sold. Yeah. So that they evolved from. So that went from a Saturday morning to by the time I qualified and a year and a half in, in hospitals.

[00:04:21] So I thought that time I was about eighty nine and then joined Richard. So Richard basically phoned me up and said, do you want a job. But if you want a job you need to do a masters. So I joined him as his apprentice really went to work. So I said Friday night I got to work at Food Drive to Essex and then Friday evening I could work day surgery. So goddamn 10 o’clock at night people would come along and have it done. And then so that was he was doing Saturdays, as I was saying Friday evenings and now. It’s through surgery, nearly a five day a week practice, that’s those built on perio. And they very much built on implants because implants became a large part of perio activity and we were right at the beginning of that, but and that is a big thing.

[00:05:20] I started implants before he did. All right. So I was really fortunate. My second job was in Pecking, so I’d say more than anything. So we had fantastic consultants there and we had a brilliant senior registrar called Brian Littler, and he was putting in the implants for John Basford and the London. So we were taking pictures out of the London hospital and putting implanted in. And then John Basford was in the process. So that was we were really early on the activity that was in 1988. Well, so I go back along along with the prime system. And are you still using the wrong system now? So. So the thing to do, the things you learn as you go through life, at one point we were running five implant systems and partly that was because we were running a program at guys and we thought there were benefits to immersing people in a lot of systems. And what you learn from that is you actually confuse people a bit in some respects. It’s like, you know, you’re going to play golf, play with one set of clubs, don’t keep giving someone a different set of clubs every day as they were. Just just get confused. So we condensed it down, guys, and we also then condensed it down in our practice because we were running we’re running a mirror image so that we we were doing things in practice that we were then teaching in the hospital.

[00:06:57] And we’re familiar with all those systems. But then you have all the trials and tribulations of trying to run different kids, different spare’s different implants, and then as patients then come back to you for problems, which they always do, you’re trying to remember what went in or what the components were.

[00:07:17] Screwdrivers were what the top levels were just becomes a whole complete nightmare.

[00:07:23] So now actually we’ve basically use Astra and we use the Astra TX, so I’ve been resistant to changing that. So they evolved for the last five years, I suppose, introducing some of the research on the bone loss around Astraea implants.

[00:07:43] So we were very early on. We were very lucky that we were looking for people to run trials for the Astra ST. Once I remember the first I met Michael, nor have you interviewed him yet?

[00:07:55] No one to as a recommendation, say he’s a good raconteur and you know that he he sold the system incredibly well. So it was a very good system. It was very innovative and it’s in the way you could handle it. It’s quite user friendly.

[00:08:13] But then we were given the the early trial of the assay, which was the first Astra implants that had a.. Rotation indexing. So we did a small trial and they asked us to play and restoration, and that was with Brian Smith, who was the prosthodontics they got guys and what was it was to do up to that point?

[00:08:35] It was sort of standard thinking that you would always lose some bone up to the first thread.

[00:08:40] Yeah, that’s that’s a pretty. So we can literally print them out. And it has its good things and its bad things. But what we knew was that it would always lose power to the first strike and that’s part of the design of it. And it’s probably largely relates to it being a peripheral fit implant with an external fit. So where the implant meets you have a big biological insult coming through the stack of componentry. So it’s almost like a biological waste of that implant. And that’s why it goes to the first side is largely, I think, of, well, health there. And then so the Astra by almost by accident, was one of the early platforms, which is a platform switching implant with a really good seal. It’s called the conical. So it’s not it’s not a perfect seal, but it’s it just reduces that biological insult from the implant abutment junction. And so that really did hold the bone very well. And also the other component of that system at that point was the. So we’re using a single teeth. So that’s a sealed system. You’ve got a semantic crown. There’s not much leakage. And then their abutments were solid and they certainly are a lot of them still all. So the uniform is a solid column of titanium. So you don’t get a biological leak from the stack of componentry, so you don’t get a insole bone level. So it delivered on two levels. So it was platform switching and there wasn’t much in the way of biofilm within the stack of components. And that’s what made the big difference. So they always thought or promoted the concept of the micro threading and in the Corona portion of that implant, but that’s probably not the most important thing and it’s also one of the early surface traceroute implants. Yeah, it was. And that was really making a difference of.

[00:10:53] What’s changed in that period of time when it comes to implant dentistry? My involvement with dentists is primarily having conversations with them about the type of patients that are coming through the door, but also the interaction. And I’ll just give you my take on things. There’s this whole new and I know it’s not new people. There’s been this upsurge in the market of people promoting and offering immediate loaded S.A.T. solutions. And I’ve come across clinicians who are for or against that and various various arguments. And then there’s been, I would say, a growth of the interaction between the clinical dental technician and the implant dentist. And that how many of those two types of clinicians and I don’t know if you if you worked in that sort of collaboration before and if you got any thoughts on that, the answer would come to this as well.

[00:11:45] So the most important thing that the golden thing to remember in whatever you do, it’s all about case selection and in case selection, the first thing is patient selection. And the next thing is what are you going to do in that patient? So it’s the case selection within the patient selection. If you can stack up or you’ll get all your ducks in a row, then you’re going to have a quiet time. And I think our philosophy has always been to keep it simple. But obviously over decades of working, you inevitably have to take up certain new techniques and certain new philosophies.

[00:12:26] So as we spoke about earlier, there isn’t anything we haven’t done or tried in the past. And I always say with so logic, my philosophy, I suppose because I’m the one who is doing most of it, is you don’t push the envelope too far. So we don’t actively promote our business based on taking a day or immediate loading. But again, I’m not averse to it in the right situation. And the best example I could suggest is that immediate placement is that easy. If you got a small route and a big employer, an immediate load is that easy. If you’ve got a big problem and the occlusion is you just stack up all the right base to enable you to get to the end result. But our philosophy and that it’s not an uncommon one is that every time you lose an employer, it might be a small percentage of your activity, but it’s one hundred percent of the patient. And you’ve you’ve got to be very brave to actually put yourself in a position where you will either encouraging or allowing a patient to take your choice, where they’re taking out and then ultimately high risk for what effectively is a great gain in the scheme of things.

[00:13:50] If you can just delay things for a few months and be much nearer to one hundred percent, why would you make life so much more complicated for everyone and the added expense of it as well? So it’s always and obviously not always. So I always say always, but by and large, you add expense and complexity to the whole situation. And if you add expense and complexity and it fails, you failed on a higher level. Yeah, and that’s where you can really struggle with patients happy so that our overall philosophy really is that we still do immediate loading. We’ve done some really quite significant cases of patients walking in with periodontal involved, not particularly well kept teeth, but for their psychological well-being to actually give them a clearance and then give them full foot bridges in a day. Don’t don’t enjoy. I don’t I don’t feel any kudo’s doing it. I’ve done it to help the patient more than anything.

[00:15:10] So are there any, shall we say, sort of clinical biological benefits and in certain cases of giving, e.g. Lodin or if you were given choice and is the always patient driven in the sense that it’s more lifestyle? And if you would say, I don’t know, extrapolate out one year, two years, five years down the line, are there any benefits of immediate loading versus delayed loading apart from the inconvenience to the patient during the integration side?

[00:15:41] I think that most the evidence would suggest that other than the old millimeter of bone here or there, the differences aren’t great. So that it helps you argue it both ways, doesn’t it, that there’s no harm in doing it, but that the risks can be a little bit higher?

[00:15:59] Is there any any evidence pointing towards sort of failure rates and things like that with respect to immediate verses and then the whole argument that some people say, well, you only need four implants and some clinicians I speak to say, you know what, even if I’m immediately then I’m not going I’m not going to let it all hang on or I’ll put in five or six for the amount of time it takes me to stick in another one or two. It’s not worth the risk. But just on that front, is there any evidence that the risk of failure is higher with immediate loading?

[00:16:32] Yeah, there’s definitely slightly higher risk, but there’s there’s evidence to show it both ways. But overall, you have to accept there is a slightly higher risk. And again, because we grew up with Branum and we grew up with that in the back of our minds, that it was in the maxilla like a 15 percent failure rate over 10 years will be. When you look at all the stocks that you look at now, that’s that’s a completely different way of looking at implants. So we were we were in early and we had to accept that we were having to build a quite a high failure rate. And part of the reason the implants were so expensive from the get go wasn’t so much that it was expensive to actually start at the start up costs was significant. So the kids were really expensive. The drone attacks were expensive, but also in the background, the the fees were building in a degree of failure because we thought we were going to have to retreat more patients than we ever did. Not never got a refund. But that was it was a it was a philosophy and it was it was the right philosophy.

[00:17:40] And so we also had a protocol where we’ve never. Never say never, never say never, but we always try and not treat patients on to a budget. So if it means not treating a patient, I know it sounds mean, but we’d rather not treat a patient than try and treat them on the cheap and compromise what you do. So the other way looking that is when we when we had significant say about it that would accommodate three implants.

[00:18:17] You’d rather it’s in the early days, put three in and expect one of them to fail rather than put two in for the same things and then hope and pray that you didn’t lose one because then that’s catastrophic. So we fail. Team failure in lots and lots of our case is still part of our philosophy now that you should try and accommodate some degree of failure within within what you’re trying to do.

[00:18:47] We also know that we are really, really bad at predicting failure of a person’s dentition, whether it’s restorative. We operate on flavor. You know, anything. You’re probably a bit more certain we’ll treat you well by time period. But, you know, some of the bigger classes, you try and choose a path where you’ve got a parachute at some point down the line, but the truth will out and they never fight in the way you think.

[00:19:17] You remember any cases where either failure had a big impact on you clinically or just emotionally or perhaps the first time an implant failed. And how that felt and how you how you dealt with it obviously happens to everyone. And many implant surgeons I’ve spoken to, it’s you know, it’s like getting a letter from the GDC, not quite as bad as that is. That’s heart sinking feeling where they feel like, you know, what could have they done differently?

[00:19:47] And have there been any situations like that for you with patients know again, we’ve had it, there isn’t anything we are thinking we’ve not experienced. So with a failure to say so. We had a big legal case years ago where someone sued both Richard and I. Well, I filed a case back that went all the way. So we were ten days out of court. Wow, and that was stressing to the point where you would not believe. And so I think the end is very, you know, this this kind of stuff, it’s good to let people know that you share in the same experiences. And I was very lucky in that case in the rich and I were being so together. And he’s a man who is very driven and he’s classic. Is OneTouch a piece of paper once. So something comes in, lands on his desk. He comes out the next day.

[00:20:56] And I very much try and do that because if you want a quiet life to do so, that litigation was, I think, quite remarkable because what I had in the two of us was two people actually willing to take the fight and get stuff back super fast. So the other side never really had a chance to have anything over on us because every time they said something, it was back delivered robust defense and it was you know, we had more control of it because what did you learn from that process?

[00:21:41] You learn something that’s not the nicest places. The ones you get on best with can still bite you.

[00:21:48] And so you never assume that your relationship with a patient is always going to go the right way because we have a very good relationship with him and it just turned what was what do you think you must have reflected on?

[00:22:03] What was the pivotal moment when it turned? Why did it turn?

[00:22:09] You got a second opinion that probably wasn’t. Completely supportive of us. We didn’t expect it to be here. We had some kind of an implant that was that was the big problem that can be very, very difficult to manage. And so the management of him became someone else’s problem, and then that became our problem. And then when he decided to litigate, the expert was not impartial. So they forgot their duty to the call and they just felt I had a duty to the patient and they weren’t particularly careful.

[00:22:53] But so they had an axe to grind with at least one of us. And it wasn’t until very late in the day where our side said to the other side, if you got any idea who you’re trying to say, and I said, you don’t know what you mean, because the experts said that Richard and I were actually not trained fully what we provided. And then what? Well. He’s the first professor of implant industry in this country and I was a specialist associate, and so at that point they had to then go back to their expert and say, you know, why have you said? So he lost his credibility very, very quickly.

[00:23:44] Do you feel do you feel the weight of being at the leading edge?

[00:23:51] You know what I mean by that?

[00:23:53] I mean, I’ve talked to some dentists who say, you know, they’re well known lecturers or whatever. And when they’re doing the work, yes, they’re doing it for the patient. Yes, they’re doing it for their own self-respect and all of that. But the idea that at any point in the future, that patient could be seen by another dentist who then says, I was treated by Paul Palmer.

[00:24:12] And, you know, your reputation is is up there. So you can’t you feel the weight of that.

[00:24:18] I think we all feel the way I think I think that’s dentistry that, you know, I think my wife has always said that, you know, whenever you say a patient, a scene that someone else is going to say this.

[00:24:30] And I think that’s I suppose I suppose that a lot of your work has been by referral by for such a long time that that’s like just second nature to you.

[00:24:38] Yeah, I think that that’s implicit in a lot of our activity, that’s for sure. But I think it has I think that’s part of the stress of dentistry anyway, is that inevitably someone else will actually say your work is sort it’s almost a given and that should be your driving force to do your best, obviously. But it’s a good thing to remember that. And we’ve always tried to do our best by our patients. Sometimes it doesn’t you know, it’s not always going to go 100 percent, only if you’ve trained so many implant.

[00:25:16] So, I mean, you did you trained most of the people who went through that guy’s M.S. right now.

[00:25:21] And you’ve come at it yourself from the perio angle. But the plenty of people go go with implants from the restorative and then some come in from the oral surgery kind of angle for today. Now, I know that M.S. is not running anymore. Right.

[00:25:36] So we we them Clinton now. So that basically what happened was that in running a masters in implant industry, you get through a lot of clinical cases. So for four people on that course can just get through so much clinical activity on their own that it was not really allowing a good throughput into programs that were perio pros that were leading to a specialist certification. So it just made sense to come back from the the MSA and implants, which wasn’t it was delivering a very, very good degree and fantastic that they had an awful lot of clinical input on their clinical surgeries. But we had a lot of parents and students who were not benefiting so much. So it was better to drive a bigger and better implant.

[00:26:44] So those two degrees than if someone was thinking of if a young young dentist was thinking of going into implants now, what would be your advice as the best pathway to follow?

[00:27:00] Not not only from the educational perspective, but what to do, you know, get a mentor before I think that every now and again are some of the mentoring is good.

[00:27:13] But if, you know, all the programs will be driven by someone with more than one aspect or another. So getting a broad base I think can be difficult. But within an academic environment, I think you’re more likely to get a broader base. So, again, I think programs and certainly we’re very proud of because they get an input from and consultants or surgery and restorative. So they’re both broad based. So I think you’d still have to say that they are probably the gold standard. So an intern program. But the commitment that is is massive and you can’t deny that.

[00:28:02] How long does that take? How much does it cost? How hard is it to get onto these four years?

[00:28:07] The cost? Now there are about 20 grand a year. I think people would have to just check that. And the commitment is three days away. So it’s massive. And I feel really sorry for this. Last year has just been too painful for every one of our undergrads postgrads. It’s just been inconceivable. But is it hard to get on to that program? I think it’s really hard. It’s probably got a little bit easier. I think the numbers of the.

[00:28:43] Probably number of it might have gone down a bit, but I’ll pay you 20 grand and then you stay out of all the students you’ve told. Is it quite easy to spot talent I know Payman always talks about refers back to Dipesh and says when he first saw the passion to his work on the composite side of things, you could spot the talent straight away. And he was it was leagues ahead when you were teaching students. Can you pick the talent out pretty quickly? And if so, what are those what are those key indicators you look at and say, this guy’s going to be a good surgeon, he knows how to treatment plan, case selection, etc., etc. all of the skills of a good implant ologist because it’s not about drilling.

[00:29:33] The implant is not the key point now.

[00:29:36] So I thought we sort of drifted off a bit early because I was I was incredibly lucky that I had our training is undergraduate’s was very, very, very good. So we had a big surgical program. So we had probably at the London and the old surgery department that was actually amazing. So we took hundreds of teeth out. We could load the search crews out finals. You could end up doing an impacted wisdom, tooth surgical removal as part of your final exam rather than just doing something in concert. And then I did a house job and then a schedule, and that gave me a really good grounding in surgery. And then the NSA guys is obviously very surgically orientated. But I had a big restorative component to it. So we were it wasn’t just about perio. There was considerable process input. So that then gives you a really good basis to start your influence with an obviously, again, been exposed very early on to the Brenham protocol, which was so based on dictum that you can yeah, he’s a bit like playing golf.

[00:30:55] There’s a point where putting the implant in, as you say, is just the drilling the whole bit and when you can forget worrying about that.

[00:31:03] But that’s the point at which you raise your bit where you are trying to point where you’re going to be optimizing all the other bits, because all the stress for the students is, oh, God, I’ve got to drill this hole. But actually. It’s not quite that, but it’s the bit around it so is being restored to be driven and being able to think about all those facets rather than getting the implanted.

[00:31:34] So just going back to that question, when it comes to spotting talent, we’ve spoke to numerous educators, Payman himself, when he spotted Dipesh’s talent from a mile away. Do you spot that talent? I mean, is it obvious to you when you’ve got a cohort of students who’s going to be flying ahead? And if so, why?

[00:31:55] I think it’s you also have some that are academically very good and some are potentially very good with their hands. Yeah. And that’s obviously a bit like the most obviously is the practical side of things. So when you get someone who’s very confident in their soft tissue handling, that’s the point at which, you know, you’ve got someone who is probably going to excel. But there are plenty of times in the rough where you start and you think we’re going to have some problems here. But again, their exposure at that point just hasn’t been enough. And it’s part of the problem with undergraduates now and the reliance on what appears to be a lot in practice. Learning in practice is your exposure to enough surgery as an undergraduate and as a as a trainee that gets you to a point where you’re able to do that. So that’s how I was learning implants. The soft tissue handling and bone manipulation was sort of second nature. And that makes a big, big difference. But you can certainly take the good ones and you get most most students a very good standard.

[00:33:11] You must I mean, I said you must do you do charge more than an average guy for an implant?

[00:33:20] No, you do not know how much how much is a single unit restored in the back of the mouth if you’re in two thousand five hundred.

[00:33:30] For us, and that’s that would be standard. And that’s how you just got to. So things I remember about myself, my brother, is that we are quite good at what we do and we’re very efficient. So if you look to our hourly rate, it’s probably better by virtue of the fact that we are incredibly efficient at what we do.

[00:33:53] So how fast, how fast are you how how fast you can go and you are still the still actually mostly a few minutes.

[00:34:04] Well, he’s about 15 minutes. But that so it’s all the stuff around isn’t it. So it’s patient, a local analgesics also stuff.

[00:34:15] So I still largely book out an alpha for one between one and four implants will probably still be an hour. And if it’s a single then I’m going to finish well within the hour if it’s full and it’s going to be a little bit of time.

[00:34:32] But that that makes me, you know, I think a highly efficient individual. Whereas other people that’s a classic, you know, some of the most expensive things, they’re are being used to spend an entire afternoon putting one in on it now. Yeah, that’s fine. I don’t know how you do that.

[00:34:55] It reminds you that they’re not making any more money.

[00:34:59] That’s not something, isn’t it? It’s what charges it is. We want wanted to be comfortable with what we charge as well. So, you know, we hate proctoring. So we try and sort of apply a middle line in the West and we’re not wildly expensive either. We can always kept at a reasonable level.

[00:35:21] I was right here on the show and I was saying to him that every time he’s in the mouth, he’s probably doing something outside of the ordinary. And, you know, dentists know him as a sort of top restorative guy. But every time he meets a patient, he has to sort of justify himself to the patient because the patient doesn’t know who he is. And he said there’s an element of the referral then to sort of saying it.

[00:35:49] But do you find that problem? I mean, amongst dentists, you’re so highly regarded, but you have to keep telling yourself to patients every time you meet them and if you become good at that as well.

[00:35:59] No, don’t know if you even bother with that, you know, because I trust the dentist in all good faith and I think that is that’s the biggest thing that’s going to put you in the right place for the patient. So we’re quite straight talking.

[00:36:21] We don’t we don’t try to promote ourselves massively. We try to talk to patients on their level. So I think I hope we come over as trustworthy and we thrown back as many as we come through the door. There’s lots of places we won’t treat or don’t treat. Also to have something else we give them. We try to give them all the options they have.

[00:36:42] So I don’t I don’t sell implants. I don’t I don’t need to. And I often say to patients that I’m busy enough. I don’t need to trade you. So if I take it or leave it with us, I don’t mind patients. Some patients won’t like won’t like me. And that’s the way some patients will either gel with you or they won’t. I think we’re very lucky in Essex where you have a broad church of patients coming in, but you’re all on the same sort of level.

[00:37:20] Yeah, I like that. About a 16.

[00:37:24] Yeah, but they all live in the place that we have a very, very high tech, smart practice and it was purpose-built and we’re very proud of it and our staff are very proud of it. And they all they’re not driving it to create an income for their driving it. So you give patients the treatment and that comes over so we don’t have to sell anything. The site has been done. If someone sits in our chair, the chances of me not being you know, if I had the mind to do it, I could probably put an implant in just about every patient to walk through the door. But that’s not never been our philosophy. It’s always be that they need it to explode all the other possibilities.

[00:38:09] You know, is there something else that I could have done just just on that conversation of budget? Because if we look at implant, dentistry is probably one of the most expensive treatments that you can invest in, especially if you’re going for so full natural mouthfeel, need full mouth to sort of implant dentistry. And you mentioned earlier that one of your philosophies is you don’t let budget drive the treatment plan because that that could compromise your treatment plan, I guess. Do you ever speak to patients about the replacement of so how long this bridge is going to last, what the future cost of that could be? You know, when you when you get patients in clinics and a bridge is going to be several thousand pounds, and when we know it’s not going to last forever, is that a conversation that comes up or that you ask if we have with your patients?

[00:39:00] Yes. So I try and I try and impress on our students as well.

[00:39:05] So it’s quite good with being in practice and in the academic environment because you’re trying to teach people, but you’re also trying to teach them how to behave in practice and how best to look after their patients and how best to keep yourself out of court and out of the way of the GDC, and that he’s about giving them the information they need. So one of my go to things is looking at ten year data, which is the pool data. So it doesn’t have to be specific to your own activity necessarily. But if you pull data and tell them about ten year data that usually they can cope with that and get their heads around that.

[00:39:51] And what I often say to patients is if I didn’t think this would last ten years, I would be telling you not to have it done. It doesn’t mean it’s going to last ten years. But on balance and on average, I would expect this to be that in ten years time. And if I don’t believe that, then I shouldn’t do it. And I shouldn’t be encouraging you to have it done. And your patients, fortunately, do see ten years as a reasonable time frame and a good time frame for things to last. But that’s I think that’s the best way in the fairest way to do that as pool.

[00:40:30] How much of your work is classic perio work?

[00:40:35] How much is implant or none? But there’s not none. But it’s tiny so. But do we implant itis? Is that something you’re looking at? Someone’s accused of being a one trick pony. You had some while ago, which was stuck in my craw for a long time. So I’ve never given up perio and I’m happy to hear. But I’m surrounded by. Some very, very good periodontist in our practices, so unfortunate that they pick up that stuff, I’ll pick up on items, the take up on that is not quite so, so good. So I tend to do a reasonable amount. But again, I don’t dress it up in any great way.

[00:41:19] I don’t make it too technical. But overall, we have fairly good results with that, actually. So I’m very pleased that today they’re not they’re not great today. So it’s not it’s not a good place to start your relationship with a patient or in your relationship with a patient, because obviously things are going awry and we are looking at an avalanche of very important items that’s going to hit us.

[00:41:45] What’s your position like? What do you think is going to happen?

[00:41:48] I think we all agree that it is an inevitability, I’m afraid, fortunately out and we don’t have a huge amount of coming in that is of our doing. But obviously there is some I think we probably become a bit more cautious as well. So, again, in that case, selection. So where patients don’t have a great deal of attached Sokoya and stuff like that, again, you’re trying to do your best to not pay yourself to corner some point down the line. So I hope in our activities we’re reducing the chances of it happening, but we’re also more aggressive. And so when we identify it, we tend to be more aggressive early on.

[00:42:30] So it’s like a like a flat procedure.

[00:42:33] Yeah, definitely. So if you see it as an active, I’d say he’s only saying time to openly debride it. And I I’m one of the people who doesn’t I’m not concerned about using state instruments on implants, but I think they’re still the best. You’ve got contaminated surface. It’s a wrecked surface. There’s nothing you can do that’s going to preserve the surface. So you might as well get in debride aggressive way as you can. Again, your respective. So you’ll mostly effectively. Are you repositioning as much as you dare? Or you can give the aesthetic, though using adjectives like azithromycin seems to have an effect. But fortunately, overall, I think I get some good, good results. But they are the expensive, sometimes showing more metal, having more space on them. Is this going back to good old fashioned perio surgery? Unfortunately.

[00:43:36] Who are frustrated? I mean, I’m frustrated by how little perio has moved. Well, I don’t know if it’s partly partly periodontist or whatever the new thing comes along I’ll miss. So many fans have come and gone. The periodontist are so anti anything other than debridement.

[00:43:55] No, like is renaming everything from reclassifying it.

[00:44:02] I mean, every dentist must lie, lie back and try and try and invent the cure. It’s just amazing.

[00:44:10] Maybe it’s just I find it totally frustrating that a lot of people are out there.

[00:44:18] You’re just trying to muck around with it on an academic level where in some respects know for the most part the patients is actually a simple disease to treat.

[00:44:30] But it has complexities because you are evolving so often, so many take. And with Ruggie support, so, you know, that’s frustrating. They’re all places that do appear from nowhere, obviously, but I think one of the good things about her is that if you do actually deployed and so what is it now? Some changeable professional mechanical platform is the pmrp.

[00:45:07] Penalty is nearly palmitate fire, so it’s. That’s why they’re coming down and it’s just it’s good to realize that that is the number perio, but it’s also the biggest thing. And that is often the is the home care.

[00:45:25] So if you can’t drive very early on into the patient, but the bulk of periodontal treatment is home care, if you don’t get that message through early on, you’re probably onto a loser.

[00:45:40] I won’t be frustrated by that. I think some of the techniques are fantastic. And unfortunately, some of the most widely propagated and promoted techniques are actually all about recession that no one sees or cares about as far as I’m concerned, for the most part. And I find that frustrating. But, you know, that’s that’s the world we live in.

[00:45:59] So a couple of things when it comes to the peril that I see shopped around, one of the mizin repeated treatment with whatever laser it is for several thousand, if not tens of thousands of pounds marketed as the as the sort of cure. I’d like to get your take on that.

[00:46:19] And then and then the stuff you talking about propagates. And he talked about stuff like pinhole, surgical technique and stuff like that.

[00:46:25] Yes, I see techniques that recession and things like that. But for the most part of the country now he’s proper perio, but largely is is not required. Yeah. Cosmetic, which is truly cosmetic. And that’s a great thing. But yes, around four fives and sixes, that’s where I start to struggle. So I think again, after a little bit careful.

[00:46:52] But the last time I saw it shown in a lecture and shown as this is laser therapy, it was the closest thing to subdural Curatola and I mean curtilage, which is now with the new classification, an obsolete term because you shouldn’t do it unless it’s a periodontal lateral prophylaxis. It was the closest thing to that I have seen in 20 years being shown as this is laser therapy and it blatantly isn’t. So I think some of the people who try and promote it are not actually delivering it, as you would describe it. So if it was waving a laser down a pocket and it worked well, you know, who wouldn’t want that and who wouldn’t love that to be the case? And if it was that, why isn’t it really cheap? But they obviously isn’t.

[00:47:43] And it’s there’s no research or evidence that points to that being the trouble is there is there is supporting evidence.

[00:47:53] But the problem is then when you look at you’re not looking at like for like so if do laser treatment and you’ll know mechanically removing plaque, then you’re probably not going to get much of a result. But the minute you start to mechanically remove plaque professionally, then the level of what you do that is very much under the control of the operator. And it’s to set up a controlled study which is truly blind. And where you truly deliver an equivalent treatment can also be very difficult. What are your memories of the surgery and the data that came from that? The level of scaling root plating that the Swedes did in the good old days was phenomenal. Now, like over an hour on a one motivated to just heart such high end intervention that it doesn’t even compare to what you can deliver. And so if you introduce that into a study where you’re introducing a laser and you have the ability to manipulate the tissues outside of that, then there’s an opening to show more effect than maybe there is in the true world. But that’s the biggest problem.

[00:49:16] Would you do such a sort of variation of different things that you teach you research?

[00:49:25] And then you treat patients and and you know this on the patient side, this kind of mccolm on every side, and there’s the sort of treatment planning side and you write books and all that.

[00:49:36] What’s your favorite of those? Is it the mix? You like what you like the most? I mean, the university environment.

[00:49:44] So I have been blessed with with my career because once I started working in a practice that gave me another home outside of general practice and then very quickly became exclusively in perio practice, privately and in the academia. I’ve had a great mix of places I work. So for the last 20 years I worked in three practices and that guys. And that gives you a really nice it’s a complex world, but it’s also really nice because you’re in a different room every day. You have a different nurse. Most days often say, if I got into practice, I’ll probably be dead by now. I don’t think I could have coped with it. One room, one nurse. It wouldn’t have been good for me. So I had been really fortunate. So, you know, I think you can love and hate them equally, but a bad day in practice just, you know, can be really, really bad on be a good day. Practice, it’s very fulfilling, but having the mix and having a good group of colleagues and a network of friends are probably the reason I’m talking to you, was one of our students and he’s now my boss. And we have a great network of friends, colleagues who work for a lot of the time. We all like minded, but we all have different opinions and we have different ways of working, but we all bounce off each other as well. So when we get frustrated or we’re a bad case, we have a WhatsApp group and we share stuff online. So I think we’re lucky. And now it’s a different world, isn’t it? Twenty years ago, you could have been in practice and never you might never speak to another dentist, let alone a whole group of them.

[00:51:52] So are you on Instagram?

[00:51:54] No, I’m not. Tell us to go on Instagram. I’ll choose my hat or choose my hairdresser, my optician. My this is on the Instagram is a map top up on top of an idea on my way.

[00:52:16] And Paul’s outside would go so out of hand to us.

[00:52:20] The same question. Go for me. Yeah. So your favorite at eBay, you mentioned outside of work, what do you do for fun? So when you mentioned comparing golf clubs to implement tools, it’s I’m guessing not that features somewhere and.

[00:52:36] But tell us what tell us what you do outside of academia and practice to relax.

[00:52:44] If you Times is watching this game, you play golf and it’s not pretty. Basically once a year and it’s usually a charity thing or something gets me to dust the clubs off. So but I appreciate the technicalities of that and how difficult that is and more by the time you need to play such a key hole that they should go for it.

[00:53:08] That’s a use as an analogy. I love my rugby, but so I’m a bit sad today. And so I’ve used that sometimes in my teaching where you’re trying to get people to look at a perspective and you can say is sometimes like, you know, Jonny Wilkinson is lining up a kick. You’ve got to look at it in such a way. You’ve you’ve got to visualize it and you’ve got to put it in plain view as you can and break it down to that point. So it’s the machinations of those things. So, yeah, I’m not quite a sport, but my biggest activity was exciting stuff, saying if you had a week to sell, what would you be doing outside of work?

[00:53:56] So we recycle a lot. So we’re going down the coast to coast in May. We just we snuck in before Boris’s announcement. So we we booked a welcome to Bridlington cycle. Right. Actually, my brother Richard and his wife, my wife and our daughter. So we’re doing that. So that sort of thing. If we got a holiday, it’s an active one. We I can’t I cannot sit on the beach. I mean, look at the look at the colour of my guys. So I’m pale and pasty. I still have the sun off on the beach, the most uncomfortable place on Earth. So I’ll have to sit in the warm shade and read a book or cycle sail to all that stuff.

[00:54:43] It’s been a great honor to meet you. But having heard so many stories about you from a lot of your students, and and we got some great laughs over the years of that lately.

[00:54:58] Yeah. My good friend to all of them worked under Paul and his brother and Pete friend, who I’ve known for years and years and years, always used to tell me about it. So it’s been lovely to meet you, but always ends it on the same question.

[00:55:14] I do. I do. I’ve got I’ve actually got one more question if that’s OK. Know, we’ll kick off with that. And it’s just because it comes up a lot with people I speak to and that’s zygomatic implant’s.

[00:55:26] And you’ll I just want I just want your thoughts on it, because you know what? I’ve come across some dentists who jump on a weekend course to learn zygomatic implants.

[00:55:35] I personally think that’s bonkers.

[00:55:37] And then whatever your philosophy is on it, what sort of training and qualifications do you think somebody should have to be doing that, that level of surgery?

[00:55:49] That’s always a tricky one. I’m not staying at the door letting people in and excluding people. So I think it’s dangerous to even stranger than the line of who who should or shouldn’t, because at the end of the day, the person holding the drill is the one who has to answer so self and the gdc. So it not how much training you’ve had and what courses you’ve done. At the end of the day, you’ve got to be able to be confident in your own ability and working within your own ability. That again, is what we try and instill in our students and our the people we work with. Because once you lose that insight, life gets difficult and dangerous for all of us. But it’s automatic imprisonment. So you have a good enough record and in the right hands they certainly have a place. But what they actually can deliver again is another one. It’s a common philosophy, isn’t it? And one used by by Boris of Light, which is under promise and over deliver. And I think once you’re at the level where you’re starting zygomatic in your stance across the lines where delivery could prove very problematic. So just proceed with caution would be my word with it. It’s not something again, we know well our level of expertise. And when it comes to that, we’ll we’d found that out if we felt it appropriate to have anyone within our practices to actually provide some interest.

[00:57:31] And so on to my final question, Paul. So much in it’s your last day on the planet.

[00:57:40] You’ve got all your loved ones around you, and you need to leave them with three pieces of wisdom, obstructer of advice.

[00:57:49] If I did this one, three, I think you know that. Don’t don’t forget overpromise under promise and over deliver a good one, but you choose yourself and always try and work within your own capabilities because otherwise life is going to be difficult. Now I look after each other really nothing, nothing, nothing groundbreaking there is that it comes down to what your values are really.

[00:58:20] And you have to ride it out. Don’t what you’re also like broken glass.

[00:58:23] But let’s leave.

[00:58:26] I may you might save some people’s backsides. They’re finally available. And how would you like to be remembered, Paul, if if that upset, then this sense and it was Paul loss, how would you like to be remembered for good company?

[00:58:49] I like making people laugh and I think, OK, most most I can do that without causing offence. I hope people think that I do bring about humor into their lives more than anything I do. And I’ve spent my whole life pissing about expense out of classrooms and detention. And I’ve read one of my reports the other day which was post preoccupied with, you know, amusing the rest of the class. Everyone’s expense, not just his own, but erm I suppose is one of my traits. I’m disruptive, I’m a disruptor I think. But no, I don’t do it maliciously, but I can’t, I can’t resist the old gag and luckily actually you know today of not being pulled out of a. Professionally, it must have been close a few times, and I know that Richard would have would have been close a few times as well when one of your students told me he was one of the lads, always one of the lads.

[00:59:58] And that could be that could be your undoing as well. So, yeah, we really like to be a part of that.

[01:00:05] It’s good to have a good relationship. You know, I think the best of the British society, period, period, ontologies always had a good image of being in a place where you can go and learn a bit, but also have some fun, have some fun and hopefully we’ll get some of that sometime soon.

[01:00:28] And the last question for you, about a month left.

[01:00:32] What do you do in that month?

[01:00:34] Isn’t that what amazes me is that people who go back to work, I seriously, I.

[01:00:45] But yeah, I would not be doing that, that’s for sure. What do you think? I didn’t go particularly mad. A party which is spending time, you know, very, very nice life. No. Where we walk away so I can only do stuff. Let’s spend it with our our children are everything to us and we want to spend it with them.

[01:01:11] Are they going to need some nice stuff. How old are your kids? Twenty nine. Twenty six. I loved talking to you made it actually it was terrifying, as I expected it to be, just to chat down the people, you know.

[01:01:34] Yeah. Yeah, I know. Thank you so much for doing it.

[01:01:38] You know, welcome. This is Dental Leaders. The podcast where you get to go one on one with emerging leaders in dentistry.

[01:01:52] Your hosts Paymen Langroudi and Prav Solanki. 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 got some value out of it if you did get some value out of it.

[01:02:13] Think about subscribing and if you would share this with a friend who you think might get some value out of it, too. Thank you so, so, so much for listening. Thanks. And don’t forget our six star rating.

Prav Soulanki: You know, I think what’s really important here is that they have that true moment of realisation themselves that if this is their dream and this is their ambition and this is what they want to do with their business then switch that bloody aggression on and give it 110% and I’ve always been one of these people who believes that if you really want to succeed, you really want to do it, you need that pig-headed discipline and aggression to attack it with and if that is distracted with two thirds of your week, or whatever it is, somewhere else, being told what to do, working in a way that you don’t want to work, it’s just going to kill your energy for growth.

Speaker 2: 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 Soulanki.

Prav Soulanki: Gives me great pleasure to introduce David Hossein to the Dental Leaders podcast. Me and David have had a few conversations over the last year or two, just sharing mutual clients and we just started talking about treatment of dental accountancy and I’ve spoke to a lot of dental accountants over the years and on the whole, they tend to bamboozle me with the language and I’ve found that speaking to David, he seems to break everything down really simply to understand and just full transparency here, David’s not my accountant, but I do respect him and the advice he gives out there. So David, if we just kick it off with just a brief history of where you grew up, what your upbringing was like, and then how you then got into your passion, which is crunching numbers for dentists.

David Hossein: Thanks Prav and thanks Payman. So Manchester lad, grew up in Stretford.

Prav Soulanki: Red or a blue mate?

David Hossein: I am a blue, even though I grew up round the corner from Manchester United. I think for me when the Glazers came in, it became less about football and more about money. Yeah, I think at that time, I was just quite impressed by the loyalty of City fans, how crap their team was but they still stuck by them. So that won me over and it worked out well in the end, so not a bad story. Yeah, grew up in Manchester, never really lived anywhere else apart from a short stint in London and did a bit of travelling, like you do in your youth. How did I get into accountancy? Well, my father encouraged me to take it up, it was something he did as well. So yeah, I think it helped me make my decision because it wasn’t something I would have ever chosen if I’m honest with you, but it turns out I’m actually good at it, so I’m happy for that.

Prav Soulanki: When you were at school, were you one of these numbers guys? Like top of your class at maths and maths geek, not great at English, sort of thing and just accelerating in one subject? Was that your strength?

David Hossein: No, no, not at all, not at all.

Prav Soulanki: No?

David Hossein: I don’t see accountancy necessarily about numbers. I think the software and a calculator will do a lot of the maths for you, I think to be a good accountant, you should be [inaudible] minded and that comes with experience.

Prav Soulanki: So what was the pathway? What was the pathway for you? Did you do GCSEs, A Levels or O Level, whatever the equivalents were back then and then …

David Hossein: Yeah, did GCSEs, did business studies at A Level and as I say, my father guided me into that. Passed my exams, got a training contract and the rest is history and here I am today.

Payman Langroud…: So are you a chartered accountant?

Prav Soulanki: So after you became a qualified accountant?

David Hossein: Yes, I’m a qualified accountant and I also sat my chartered taxation exams as well. That was really helpful for a lot of what I do now, because being an accountant and being a tax advisor is … they’re similar but different. A lot of the transactional tax advisory work, you’ll only get that if you’ve done the tax exams. So that does help in a lot of my work, yeah.

Prav Soulanki: How did you get into dentistry?

David Hossein: Funnily enough, I was at uni, I’ve always had friends who are dentists and naturally they became clients and just did more and more of it until that’s pretty much 95% of what I do now.

Payman Langroud…: So David, there’s more to it than just working out accounts for associates and practises. I mean, tell me about the scope of business. I guess you’ve got that self-employed bit, you’ve got the business owner bit, what else?

David Hossein: Well, most of my work is in the transactional side. So I call myself a commercial dental accountant, which is somebody who … There’s accountants who will say, “Well, here’s your accountant, here’s your tax bill and here’s my fee for the bad news.” Or there’s someone who’s like, “Well actually, where are you in your business and where’s it going to go, and how do I fit into that and how can I support you in that?” So it’s things like business plans and cashflows for new start ups, helping a first time buyer appraise the practise and helping them through to completion really and helping mini groups with their acquisition programmes and helping them through to sales. So that’s really the majority of my work. I can do accounts and tax because obviously I’m a qualified accountant, but my main focus is working closely with my clients.

Payman Langroud…: So give some examples David, of big mistakes you’ve seen clients making that you’ve had to fix?

David Hossein: Yeah, having no accounts, not done by a dental account and it can cause problems further down the line, I think as … So dentistry performs to a very predictable format in terms of fee [inaudible], cost of sales, gross margins and KPIs. Just the accounts I’ve seen, I’ve just been like, “Well actually, this doesn’t make any sense.” In some ways, you have to start again, really then to start to understand how the business is actually performing. That can be more common than it should be. Things like flawed incorporations, so people saying, “Well, I want to have a limited company because it’s going to save on tax.” But then it’s not done by a dental accountant, they don’t understand that you need to have the contracts [inaudible] properly, otherwise the tax man will just cut through it and say, “Well actually, you’ve not done it properly, therefore no you’re not having these tax savings.” Then when you’re coming to sell, that’s another problem that then the buyers can’t understand the structure because it’s not done properly. So I think having somebody who understands the specifics of your area and your business and dentistry, I think is valuable.

Prav Soulanki: David, I’ve got a situation where I co-own a group of practises. I was advised by an accountant, non-dental, or we were as co-owners, of how to structure our company and then how to extract those funds personally, appropriate times and when we declare our divs and whatnot and just maximise on that position, right?

David Hossein: Yes.

Prav Soulanki: However our accountant advises us. Anyway, time went on, the practise moved to another accountant. We got the news that had we had a different structure, i.e. and I’ll just give you an overview, we’ve got a holding company, an LLP and two limited companies that sit under the hodling company because when profits get pushed up to the LLP, we’re paying tax at source, rather than deciding what we’re going to do and how we’re going to plan that. We’ve got no control over that, it’s like, boom, it goes straight onto your-

David Hossein: Tax return.

Prav Soulanki: … you know, your personal-

David Hossein: Yeah.

Prav Soulanki: … and you get leathered by it, you haven’t got as much control. That cost us a lot, a lot of money over the years, but as somebody who’s not accountancy-minded, or clueless about that, we trusted our advisors and we ended up going that and it was very clearly explained to us by the other accountant that, “Look, we could have saved you … ” it was in the region of multiple hundreds of thousands over years, right?

David Hossein: Yeah, yeah.

Prav Soulanki: Can you give me your insight into … Well, do you come across things like this in terms of flawed structures? Also, just a bit of advice out there, imagine you’re starting up a squat, or you’re thinking of growing a group, or whatever that is. Is there an ideal structure to operate under, depending on, I’m assuming what your goals are, whether it’s growth, where it’s acquisition by other people, or acquisition for yourself. Do you want to just run us through structure?

David Hossein: Yeah, absolutely and 100%, that’s a problem. The problem you’re talking about is where does the money go? When it comes to tax, the first thing you always have to answer is start with the end in mind, so what are we trying to achieve by this? Where does the money go? Where does the profits go and where does the capital go? Once you can pinpoint those two things, then from there, you can then map back, well how should the structure work to achieve the income distributions and the capital distributions in the future? You’re quite different Prav, because you’ve got LLP with a company, it’s probably more common where you see, say an associate first time buyer who’s buying a limited company and they have the debt held personally and the company is repaying the loan repayments and they just get hammered for that capital repayment as a dividend. So heavily taxed on it, they’ve got massive bank repayment, and they’re just left very poor from the actual residual profits. It’s entirely avoidable by having a hodling company above the practise that you’re buying, so the debt is held in there, dividends are paid up but the cash stays within the corporate structure to repay the debt and then you’re not having to pay tax on the distributions, it’s only after the bank has been repaid, so lots of structural issues to be very careful of in that scenario.

Prav Soulanki: Is there anything that you guys can to do almost unwind this?

David Hossein: It’s difficult with the bank.

Prav Soulanki: Let’s say something’s happened and you think, “Do you know what? If only the structure was like this.” Is there any point where it becomes too late, or is there a point where you say, “Actually, come and speak to … ” yourself, or somebody like yourself, who’s a commercially-minded accountant, ” … and we may be able to improve your position.” Even if something’s happened in the past the A was either structurally wrong or accounting, cost centres have been done differently, or like you said, the debts going in the wrong direction?

David Hossein: Yeah, it’s harder to fix once it’s in place. First of all, if the debts in the wrong place, then to move it, the banks have to be onboard with refinance and if you lock in at a very good rate, that’s a problem because they’d want a new rate. On other structural issues, yes, it’s possible but you just have to mindful of HMRC’s transactions and securities legislation which is designed for an entirely different purpose, but can tarnish other things when they have unintended consequences, but it has to be looked at on a case by case basis.

Prav Soulanki: What are the main things that you’ve noticed when speaking to clients during this whole lockdown COVID situation at the moment, in terms of the support they’ve needed? Obviously there’s been loans and things like that, cashflow forecasts and things like that, I’m assuming you’ve had to be working on, but what’s your general sense of the market now in dentistry, especially you say you help with people who are starting up new practises and you also help with acquisitions and sales and stuff like that. Can you just give us a temperature check of what’s going on in the market at the moment at both ends of the spectrum?

David Hossein: Yeah, sure. So on new side, I am seeing a lot more interest. I think associates are questioning where they are with life generally, it’s obviously been a mad time we’ve been through so people are saying, “Well, actually you know what? I’ve been through this, I’d like a bit more independence, is this quite right for me?” So I’m getting a lot more inquiries and I’ve seen a lot of people going down the squat route. I think if it’s executed correctly, I think it is a very good return on your money. So I’m seeing more on that side. On the private side, I think the first three months are quite scary for private practises, there’s a lot of uncertainty, so there was a need for, “Well, let’s have a look at the cashflow, let’s see what the situation is.” I’m very lucky that none of my clients had to close because of it, they’ve had to come through and are probably having now, couple of months, best months they’ve ever had because it’s quite difficult to get an NHS dental appointment.

David Hossein: On the selling side, there was, I think it’s fair to say, a lot of acquisitions were paused, so some of the corporates just slowed things down a bit, saying, “Well, hang on a second, let’s let the dust settle and let’s see where we are.” But that’s picking up now. So I think we’re moving towards normality now.

Payman Langroud…: Okay, how long have you been just working with dentists?

David Hossein: With just dentists, about 10 years, 10 years.

Payman Langroud…: So how would you rate the industry compared to other industries, as far as the health of the businesses that you see? Would you say it’s an easier business overall than others, or more difficult?

David Hossein: I’d say it’s actually more difficult because you’ve got the challenge of in many … Well, most of my clients anyway, are bringing in the income. So you’re having to work in the business and be responsible for all your admin and be responsible for all your marketing, and be responsible for all your team training. It’s very different, whereas other people who’ve got a business, they’ve got a corporate structure, where managing director manages the business and that’s not the case with dentistry, I think … Yeah, I don’t envy a lot of my clients. I think it’s quite a hard sector to be in, the hours they do, the responsibility they’ve got, the constant threat of litigation, so something going wrong. It’s a difficult business to be in.

David Hossein: I think that on the other side, if you get past that and you’re commercially minded and you want to go and grow something for creating value, well as a sector, healthcare, but dentistry in general is a great way to grow and build something that can generate future value but in the meantime, be careful of your mental health. Have the right people behind you, it’s a lonely, lonely sector.

Prav Soulanki: You spoke about starting a squat and it being a profitable thing if you do it right and I guess the flip side, if you’re somebody who’s just staring out and you think, “Okay, do I buy in on going concern and buy into cashflow so I hit the ground running? Or do I set up a squat and just set up a business from scratch and I’m not whacking a load of money in,” and bank finance might be easier if you’re buying a business that’s already got a proven cashflow. What would you say are the pros and cons from your perspective of saying, “Right, okay I’m going buy a practise and just … ” shall we say, hit the ground running, but I’m sure you’ve seen all the problems that come with that and then stand squat?

David Hossein: I look at it slightly differently in that what’s your natural … I think people should do what they’re naturally inclined towards. I think you’ve got natural personality times, some people are entrepreneurial and really enjoy rolling their sleeves up and doing things themself. I think that type of personality should go for a squat because if you’re buying a practise and you’re coming in and you roll your sleeves up and try and change everything, everyone’s going to be pissed off at you, and you’d have no friends and it’s going to cause you problems. And then you’ve got the other type of personality which isn’t like that and just wants to come in get started from day one with regular cashflow.

David Hossein: So I think I always look at the personality type first, but to answer your question, I think it’s less cash intensive on a squat but you’ve got to get your marketing right, you’ve got to have that right. So there’s more risk with potentially more return if it does pick up. On the acquisition side, you’ve got the benefit of walking into something that has got a cashflow, a regular income, so you’re not having to work in two places while it’s picking up. I do spend a lot of time convince people not to buy practises.

David Hossein: I think that I’ve had clients and they’ve paid too much for something that it just wasn’t right and after you’ve paid the bank back any tax, you can be actually worse off and the first thing I do when an associate’s looking to buy a practise is well, let’s please look at the numbers closely, let’s compare the post-loan repayments cashflow to what you had before and are you better off or are you worse off? If you’re 10 grand worse off, you’re comfortable with that, you’re happy that it’s tied up in the equity of the practise and as long as you’re going into it with your eyes wide open and you’ve understood, I’ll support you but if then it’s like, well it’s going to be worse off for you, I will try and get that across. The last thing I want is a client that’s miserable because if the client’s miserable then I’ll be miserable and it won’t be a healthy relationship.

Prav Soulanki: Does your role extend above and beyond business and stuff like that? I often find that when I’m speaking to clients, often bleeds into a conversation more than just marketing and you talk about work/life balance and stuff like that and sometimes I’ll have people approach me and say, “I’m thinking of buying practise two.” Because practise one is going really well and I’ve just [inaudible]. We all know that’s not reality, not for most people anyway, or somebody who’s grossing really well as an associate and they think, “Hold on a minute, the practise that I’m working for is taking 60% of the dough, I want it all.” So then they go down that route. Do you find yourself in those situations? Do you find your role extending above and beyond commercial dental accountant? Have you got any stories that you can share with us?

David Hossein: Yeah, sure. I mean, to answer the first question, absolutely, it’s not just about your numbers, it’s about where you are and where you’re going and how you feel and what’s driving you. Yeah, absolutely I think … Yeah, the second thing you mentioned there about the associates not happy about the 60% going, that’s very common and what I always say to people who are thinking of buying is just let’s talk it through beforehand to be clear on what your reasons are for doing it. Do something like that for the right reasons because it is a very big thing to take on and if you’ve not done it for the right reasons, it will make you unhappy. Any stories? What would you like to know?

Prav Soulanki: Summat juicy, mate.

David Hossein: Summat juicy.

Prav Soulanki: Any big names in dentistry who mucked it all up? No, I’m only kidding. Do you know what? Just something out there where you’ve seen perhaps something go wrong or that could have gone the right way, or just stories of where for example, people have bitten off more than they can chew because they didn’t quite know what they were getting into. I often find that, especially with a lot of associates, a lot of them don’t know what they’re getting into and they think grass is greener on the other side and then they realise, “Hold on a minute, I could wake up, stroll into work at 9:30, go home at half five, have my tea, watch a bit of Netflix and go to bed and now I’m doing the 14, 15, 16 hour shift and the majority of that shift is at home, stressing and thinking, or dealing with someone’s going to be off sick or whatever.” Have you had any of those scenarios perhaps, or stories where someone’s bought in and they think, “Oh my God, I can’t do this any more.” Or someone who’s been even braver and said, “Do you know what? I’ve made a massive mistake, I’m getting out of this.”

David Hossein: I have, many years ago, I do try and avoid my clients putting themselves in that situation because I’ve been through it before and I’ve had a client who really overpaid for what this practise was worth. It wasn’t my client at the time, so he came to me after he’d bought it because I would have stopped him doing that but every year, every January, it’d come to, “Here’s your tax bill,” and I won’t mention any names but it was soul destroying for him, said, “Where am I going to find this money from? I’m being taxed on this.” Don’t forget you’re taxed on your pre-bank loan profits. So if you’ve got 100 grand profits but you’re paying the bank 50, you’re only seeing 50 of that, but you’re being taxed on 100. Then if you’ve got a 40 grand tax bill on the 100, then there’s 10 grand left for you and your family. So you’ve got to really make sure you can avoid those capital repayments and yeah, he did come out, he had to cut his losses, but it’s like you say, you don’t throw good money after bad, there is a bad where actually this is not working and luckily, he could sell. He didn’t make a massive loss on it but compare that to where he is now, he’s an associate earning 100 grand, so it’s-

Prav Soulanki: A month?

David Hossein: No, not 100 grand a month, 100 grand a year.

Payman Langroud…: David, you know it’s a good exercise, yeah? Because a lot of dentists, like Prav said, want to open their second or third, or fourth sites, and in those sites they’re not going to be there, right?

David Hossein: Yes, yeah.

Payman Langroud…: In the end, they’re not going be the fee earners. So as a thought exercise, if you were going to open a dental practise, bearing in mind you’re not going to be there earning as a dentist, what would be things you would look for? Let’s say, begin with the end in mind, you want a three practise group, what would you do?

David Hossein: Man, that’s a really good question. I think it’s easier if your first practise is an NHS practise that doesn’t need to do a lot of marketing. If you can convert practise, an associate-led practise, sorry build it into an associate practise that doesn’t need you there, they often say the shift from one to two is harder than the shift from three to 10 because once you’ve three, you’ve got the seeds in place and it’s replicating the business model and the business isn’t contingent on you at three. But going from one to two is where you get cut down the middle, so you really want to make sure that practise number one is very, very self-sufficient and it’s the least of your time. It’s great if you’re not then working in it at that point and then it’s great that you can then work in the new site. Somewhere not too far, so your practise manager from site one can help and come over but yeah, it takes time and I think that’s … I think if I was giving … Go on.

Payman Langroud…: First one’s the NHS, what would your second one be? NHS too?

David Hossein: Well, if it was me, I think that it depends on the location, but a second one that’s private, is a private squat, would be attractive to me because I think your investment at that point is less but at the same time, if the cashflows work to buying another practise, then obviously go for that, but as you know, valuations aren’t very high, so you’ve got to make sure that cashflow works and then when you’ve got two and you’ve got a third one, then you add in then, do you need centralization of your processes and that’s another headache. Do we need a head office?

Prav Soulanki: Do you know, what I find about that, you say practise one NHS, practise two private, but systems and processes in place for expansion-

Payman Langroud…: They’re different types of practises aren’t they?

Prav Soulanki: Yeah, so surely in my … I’ve only ever known, in terms of ownership, private and I’ve worked with practises who are mixed and the processes and the systems are entirely different. I mean, NHS dentistry and the way that’s handled and stuff, it’s a whole world I don’t really understand but when I do get let into it, it feels like chaos. The only reason I say that is because when I communicate with the team members there, it is like they’re going 110 miles an hour and when you’re in a private practise, it feels like the music levels just toned down and you’re just coasting along and it’s smoother, do you know what I mean? Because you’re more in control of everything, rather than being dictated, so the systems and processes will be different. But is the logic NHS first, private squat second?

Payman Langroud…: Well, it’s a very common way of doing it Prav, because you’ve got the guaranteed income first.

Prav Soulanki: Not so much guaranteed moving forward though maybe?

David Hossein: Yeah the question was only two sites and I’m just going off what I see as most common for what I see but I think start with the end in mind. If your goal is to have one and two, then having one that’s self-sufficient and the second is your private where you generate high level returns, that can work. If your goal is, “Actually you know what? I’m going for 10 practises here.” Then yes, acquire several ones, acquire similar ones.

Payman Langroud…: Let’s take it forward then. Yeah, let’s saying we’re going for 10 practises, now you’re at three and you’re saying we’re now looking at some head office staff. Let’s walk through it. How do we get more money? How does it work? Are you in the cash raising side of these businesses too, or not?

David Hossein: I work with the lenders on behalf of the clients but the banks love dentistry. They will give you money.

Payman Langroud…: All right.

David Hossein: So it’s entirely up to you whether you take that on. Yeah, have that now very large debt above your head.

Payman Langroud…: Let’s talk systems then, go on. Let’s say you want to go from three to 10, what should be our systems? Who should we be looking to hire? How much money should we be looking to borrow and then what’s going to be our exit story? From your perspective?

Prav Soulanki: One at a time mate?

Payman Langroud…: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know.

David Hossein: I have to say, there’s a line that I don’t cross. I don’t step into the business and put an operations person in and there’s a line I can’t go past. Prav’s probably better placed to answer that side, being on the inside, but from the outside, from what I see with my clients, then you want to have your accountancy function centralised. Associate pay, have your payroll, your associate pay centralised so take as much off your practises, have it all centralised. What else? Do you need a HR person at that point? I don’t think so, I think that having an external company can still help, you don’t need to have a HR person centralised. So when people talk about head office, we often make that into a really big thing, when in reality, it doesn’t have to be. I’ve got a client who’s just sold for a very, very good sum and their head office was very loosely put together with laptops and people working from home. It’s how you design it and what the point of the head office is. So if you can take off the payroll, take off the associate pay, paying of bills, having your accountancy function, your purchase ledger, if that can be centralised, great. Doesn’t have to be.

David Hossein: I think it also, again, going back to structures, it depends who you’ve got in the business. If it’s just you, and you want that all in once place and you pay the bills then yeah, centralise it. If you’ve got partners involved, and I think partnership models will become a lot more common going forward then you might … It depends what you agree with the partners and what you want to do, what they want to do and they might say, “Well actually, you know what? I want to pay the bills and I’ve got visibility on that.” I don’t think there’s one size fit all, I think there’s flexibility to what it actually needs. Obviously a big corporate would need to have purpose built offices and an in-house legal person and so on but I think for the smaller size clients, you don’t need something like that.

Prav Soulanki: When people are looking to set up a squat, I’m sure loads of mistakes are made, just the treatment of things financially I’m thinking about, rather than other operational business-type stuff. Are there three big tips you can give from a financial perspective? For example when people have questions like, “Buy equipment outright or lease,” for example. Can you tap into that but also maybe a couple of other for examples where you can just give some advice of what are the best ways to treat different areas of your business from an accounts issue, a tax perspective, to maximise things for you moving forward?

David Hossein: Well, for a squat, the absolute priority is not to spend all your cash and be as pessimistic as you can on how long it will take you to get new patients. If you’re over-confident with it, “You know what? I’m going to have 20 grand a month from day one,” then you’ll base your decisions on that and over commit your cash. Cash is the blood of any business. When it comes to a squat, I always say well, “Well, do you need to do two surgeries from day one?” If you’ve got a certain amount of cash, let’s do one surgery, wait for that to be full before committing to the second and third and so on. So doing things in a staged process if very common, so should I buy something on hire purchase or cash? If you’ve got the cash and you’re 100% certain you don’t need it, and you’ve got a bit in reserve after that, because always have something for a rainy day, then if you’re buy it cash, then you won’t have to pay the interest charge, which although it is tax deductible, then if you’re a company, let’s say it’s 19%, 81% is still a real cost to you, so that’s worth considering.

David Hossein: However, from a tax point of view, doesn’t make a difference. Whether you buy it cash, or whether you buy it on hire purchase, let’s say your year end is the 31st of March and you sign the contract on the 31st of March, you will get the full tax relief on that asset in that financial year. So if there’s no real tax, it’s more about, well can afford to lose that-

Prav Soulanki: Cashflow.

David Hossein: … yeah, cashflow and the extra cost of the interest. It’s what’s the best use of your money.

Prav Soulanki: Any other sort of … So, that’s many one example where I’ve definitely heard questions in Facebook forums and groups where people say, “Should I buy, should I lease … ” are there any other examples of those type of scenarios?

Payman Langroud…: Very commonly people overestimate how quickly business is going to come in, right David? But it’s interesting because if you’re an associate and you’re going to do your first squat, I mean, how you going to even get anything accurate on how quickly you’re going to get patients in? I mean, you’ve never run a marketing campaign, what would you say? If someone says to you, “Look, I’m going to open in Manchester, how many patients a week can I expect?” I don’t know, I’ve never done it before, so what do you do? You say pessimistic, what’s pessimistic?

David Hossein: The way I work my financial models are how many surgeries are you going to put in and what’s the capacity? So I know the question you’re asking, is it five patients per week, or is it 10. I tend to work on the high level perspective, so if that surgery can generate £200,000 worth of revenue, then in month one I would assume zero percent, month two, maybe 5% and then 10% and so you build it up so to the end of year one, hopefully we’re 30% capacity, so 30% of £200,000, 60 grand income. So it’s a staged over. I think I would start with a really pessimistic perspective because if we beat it, that’s great, but if we’ve over egged it, we’ve all got egg on our face. I think it’s very important to have the right marketing team behind you and I think people like yourselves are very valuable to a new squat. I think that like you say, as an associate, you’ve probably never done marketing, you’ve never done an SEO campaign, and I certainly don’t, if I need doing, I’ll go to an expert. I think that’s where you and I probably worked a bit closely Prav, where clients have needed the help and you’ve been very helpful.

Prav Soulanki: Do you know what David? The one thing that I come across a lot is I run, call it a clinic or whatever, but I give up say 15 minutes of my time to speak to people, they can book that through my website and one of the most common inquiries, or let’s say conversations rather than inquired because they generally tend not to lead to me being able to represent them, but it’s somebody who’s a practise owner who’s working at his own practise two days a work, working as an associate three days a week and then comes to me and says, “I want to grow my practise and blow it out the water.” And they have these massive ambitions. The one thing that I find is fundamentally broken there is that job that they’ve got three days a week because that’s holding their practise back from growing, 100%-

Payman Langroud…: You mean their attention, Prav?

Prav Soulanki: Pardon?

Payman Langroud…: You mean their attention isn’t 100% on the practise?

Prav Soulanki: Well, there’s a few things. One of them is the reason they’ve got that three day a week job is they need to put food on the table. Now, the majority of people I speak to about this, they will say to me, “Oh well I’m grossing big numbers at the other practise but I want to grow this so I can do it for myself.” So then I break that down and say, “Okay, you’ve got an associate in your practise, let’s assume you change your two days to three days and gave one day up there, do you think you could make that income that you’re making there in your practise? “Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, I think I could do that.” All right, so we’re moving this conversation along, but I think it’s almost like that comfort blanket, in order for them to do that, there needs to be a point where you just say, “Do you know what? I’m going to tuck my balls in and go for it?” Like an element of risk. I find in that situation, I’ve come across so many dentists who’ve got that associate job, in order for them to get to the next level, they need to commit with 100% aggression and-

Payman Langroud…: Prav, it’s like every moment of growth in a business though, yeah? It’s scary.

Prav Soulanki: Yeah, course it is. Course it is.

Payman Langroud…: We’ve both been in the same situation ourselves. Not from a two days a week perspective but there are things we could both do which scare us and I hear what you’re saying about … skin in the game you’re basically saying. If your life depended on it, you’d really go for it, but you’re almost too comfortable in the associate job, is what you’re saying.

Prav Soulanki: Like cutting your lifeline off isn’t it?

Payman Langroud…: Yeah.

Prav Soulanki: So often the conversation we have is around life, so I will ask that dentist, look-

Payman Langroud…: It takes a personality type though Prav?

Prav Soulanki: Yeah, no, 100% mate, 100%. But if you think, if you lost that job tomorrow, is it going to change what you eat for your next meal? Is it going to change the roof over your head and is it going to change how you commute? If the answer to that question is no, and you’ve got enough ambition, just cut the cord. But if you’re depending on it for survival it becomes more difficult but those two things, the associate job and growing your practise to your dreams, they’re just incompatible. Do you come across any clients, or have you got any clients who are in that scenario or situation, where they’re just ball and chain with the job?

David Hossein: Yes, yeah I do and I think the point you’re making is valid, that it’s to the detriment of future growth in the practise. I think that there can be multiple reasons for it, if the associate’s got a small family, sorry, I beg your pardon, young kids, has got very young kids, then that situation’s giving them flexibility to spend time at home while the kids are young, then that can be one reason for it but I do agree, you look at it, that’s really frustrating because you’ve got this potential here that you could be developing and-

Payman Langroud…: It’s almost by definition the kind of associate who’s going to set up a squat has had to be quite successful as an associate to save up this money and all that, so that job then by definition is quite a good job that they had and breaking away from that is quite hard, I can see how it’s going to come up a lot actually Prav, you’re right.

Prav Soulanki: Yeah, no totally, totally and it’s hard to kiss goodbye to a regular, healthy, fat income right? That you’re used it. Whether you’re spending it or not is a different matter, what you do with it, invest it or whatever but to just cut that cord and then say, “Right, I’m going to … ” We spoke about this earlier, it’s up-climatizing is a lot easier than down-climatizing, right?

Payman Langroud…: Yeah.

Prav Soulanki: It’s much more comfortable and easier to go from a one bedroom flat to a three bedroom house but going in the other direction it’s a lot harder and the same thing, if you’re used to a juicy monthly income, no matter what you do with it, and all of a sudden you cut the cord, it’s got to be a hard pill to swallow.

Payman Langroud…: It’s interesting Prav that they’re coming to you at that point and not at the beginning. Maybe they think they can’t afford you at the beginning or something, yeah?

Prav Soulanki: I think it’s a combination a few things. A lot of people I speak to have said that they’ve been following me or blah, blah, blah, whatever, call it the long-term marketing game, where I’ll put a bit of content out there, I might resonate with some people and I’ll definitely turn a lot of people off as well. I’ll polarise people and so some people feel that I’m approachable and they can just book a 15 minute call with me, have a conversation, we have a nice chat and then going our separate ways and hopefully they walk away with some guidance or some advice or have one or two little ah-ha moments.

Prav Soulanki: Why didn’t they get in touch with me in the beginning? Maybe they didn’t know about me, who knows? But I think what’s really important here is that they have that true moment of realisation themselves, that if this their dream and this is their ambition and this is what they want to do with business, then switch that bloody aggression on and give it 110% and I’ve always been one of these people who believes that if you really want to succeed, you really want to do it, you need that pig-headed discipline and aggression to attack it with. If that is distracted with two thirds of your week, or whatever it is, somewhere else, being told what to do, working in a way that you don’t want to work, it’s just going to kill your energy for growth.

Payman Langroud…: Yeah, true. David what are the few things you wish dentists knew better?

David Hossein: Oh, good question.

Payman Langroud…: Apart from root canal.

David Hossein: We know they know that very well. What they knew better? I tell my team that if you’re waiting for someone to come back to you that’s probably because they’ve had a phone call that day with somebody in a lot of pain and they’ve had to rearrange their whole day for that, so you have to be patient with people, and try them on their lunch, that’s usually a good one.

David Hossein: I think that the benefit of being very disciplined and organised, I think that a lot of the problems that I see are rooted in … I mean, a client at the moment has set up a squat, used to have an associate limited company and it just needs closing down because he doesn’t need that company any more but it’s not been done and it’s racking up £100 a month late penalties and I keep saying, “Well look, we really just need to get rid of that because that is costing you a lot of money and you need that right now.” I think it’s very focused on, “Well, I’m in a squat now, I’ve got to focus on this.” But in the back of his mind, I know that that’ll be grinding him down. When he goes to bed at night, it’s there in the back of his head that, “I’ve still not dealt with that damn thing.” And that’ll be grinding him down. But I think the 15 minute phone call to me to sort it out for him would pay dividends mentally. So, having things that are bothering you and it’s not fun dealing with them, but not dealing with them, will cause you a lot more stress when you go home and you’re trying to relax.

Prav Soulanki: I’ve seen that and it’s something I’ve picked up on, definitely in the last few years, it’s the who not the how and I think there was a big Dan Sullivan thing that rather than trying to figure out how to do it and figure out, “Right, so I’m going to close this company down and I need to fill out this form at Companies House, blah, blah, blah, this, that and the other.” It’s like, “Who can just take this problem away from me and do it and does it every day?” And it’s that 15 minute phone call with you, is that you can take that pain away and that thing that’s holding them back from maybe just accelerating away.

David Hossein: And becoming a bigger problem because the penalties are still being … it’s more expensive not to deal with it, if it’s … You must come across that, Prav. Advice for people, one question I’ve got [inaudible] what advice would you give to dentists to make themself more, I don’t want to use the word organised because that’s condescending but as a dentist, you go into your practise and you’ve got patients, you’ve got responsibilities and there’s all this admin stuff and it’s of no value other than you have to get it done but you still have to deal with it, so switching your mindset into, “Got to get that done because it’ll just grind me down and become a problem if I don’t deal with it.” How do you coach people like that?

Prav Soulanki: I think my advice is, and I can’t remember the guy who came up … because I do a lot of reading, a lot of listening, a lot of watching and stuff and there’s this concept, it’ll come to me who the name of the guy is, there’s this concept called the three alarms and you don’t be restricted to three alarms, it could be as many alarms as you want but just think about, “Okay, this is what I’m going to do today, I’m going to wake up in the morning and I’m going to exercise. I’m going to spend some with my kids between this time and this time and I’m going to go into the office and I’m going to work efficiently like a ninja with no distractions.” Let’s imagine those are the three activities that you want to smash that day.

Prav Soulanki: So your first alarm goes off at 6:00 in the morning, call it a mental alarm, or you can just set the alarm on your phone and have a notification with it and that first alarm says, “Linford Christie, Usain Bolt, I am a world class athlete.” So you wake up, call it positive affirmations or whatever, but you say, “When I’m going into that gym, there’s no distractions, no nothing, I’m a world class athlete.” You may not, million miles away from there but you’re positively telling yourself, “This is all I’m doing.”

Payman Langroud…: Bud, bud, bud the alarm goes off on your phone and you say to yourself, “I am Linford Christie. I am Linford Christie.”

Prav Soulanki: 100% mate.

Payman Langroud…: Is that what you’re saying? Okay, okay, go on.

Prav Soulanki: Right okay, but the point I’m trying to make is you put yourself in the shoes of-

Payman Langroud…: Linford Christie.

Prav Soulanki: Or I’m a world class athlete or whatever, but I’m going to approach this like one of the top professionals in the world

Payman Langroud…: Okay, go on, go on.

Prav Soulanki: So you’ve got that mental attitude where your next alarm goes off and it’s time with your kids, best dad in the world. So what does the best dad in the world do? He takes this thing and leaves it somewhere else, because that’s the thing that’s going to distract you and I’ve got my phone in my hand and then you give 100% attention, and you do whatever the best dad in the world does. Next alarm goes off, Elon Musk, you’re in the office so you sit down and buy loads of bitcoin, I’m kidding. But do you understand what I’m saying.

Payman Langroud…: It’s the alarm, so the alarm goes off at 6:00, you go for your run and then the alarm goes off at 10:00 you look after your kids, is that what you mean?

Prav Soulanki: I’ve got a schedule to my life, I’ve got a diary which says between these hours I’m working, between these hours, I’m spending time with my kids.

Payman Langroud…: [crosstalk] alarms are going off.

Prav Soulanki: Absolutely, yeah, it’s not random mate.

Payman Langroud…: Because I was thinking snooze when you said it, because I snooze my alarm three times.

Prav Soulanki: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I’ll give you some words after this call that will reinforce those habits mate.

Payman Langroud…: David, tell me about the structure of your organisation, how many people are you, how many clients do you have?

David Hossein: So I have about 90 to 100 dentists associate practise groups. My team is five people. We’re a unit inside a bigger unit, currently Bennett Brooks is a top 80 accounting firm so we can provide a very high level tax client where needed and some of the stuff that isn’t the general side, so if you need inheritance tax or … When it comes to the exiting side, there’s a lot of work that’s needed on the tax side, so that’s set. On a day-to-day basis, most of my clients don’t need that, they just need an accountant who can understand their accounts and talk to them about their accounts and their situation.

Payman Langroud…: How do you get over … Dentists are always coming up with crazy accountancy schemes to get out of paying tax.

David Hossein: Well, I think they’ve got a lot of help from people who want to target them and that’s the frustrating thing. If I take on a new client, it’s is there anything I should know and oftentimes, “Yeah, I’ve got this thing hanging over my head and how do I deal with it?”

Payman Langroud…: Is it always BS or are there some things that you could look at? I mean, I don’t know, there was the film schemes and there was this, that and loan yourself that much and pay it back. Is it always BS, should you just avoid?

David Hossein: Anything that has the word scheme in it, yeah, I would pretty much say, “No, no please don’t do that.”

Prav Soulanki: Scheme equals scam.

David Hossein: Scheme equals scam and I do feel for dentists because one, I think they are targeted on purpose, we’ve got very unscrupulous people out there who sit down and make a list of who are the people with money that I want to go after? That’s an unfortunate part of life. I also think that practise owners have this particular problem where if you took out a loan to buy a practise, you can on paper look very rich, but sometimes be cash poor because you’re having to pay the bank back so much and you only realise that value when you sell your business and you go, “Oh thank God for that, I’m out of this now and I’ve got my million pound in the bank,” or whatever it is. So it’s a combination of the two that puts people in that situation as well, “What can I do to get this tax down?”

David Hossein: First thing is, look for the structural things that you can do to make sure everything’s structured tax efficiently, without any schemes, and there’s lots that can be done. If it’s a company, having your wife as a shareholder, just seeing how the family’s income package looks like, to have income distributed in a tax efficient way. Do those things, but when it comes to somebody calling you and saying, “Oh I’ve got a way to get your tax disappear,” just don’t do it. If you really have to do it and you’re that way inclined, let’s say it’s going to save you 200 grand, you use that money and buy a house, don’t go to Las Vegas and blow it all. So if it ever does go wrong, you’ve got the house to fall back on, then you can sell and really pay the tax and interest that they’re going to come for you for.

Payman Langroud…: Yeah, I spoke to a dentist, that’s what he was saying. He was saying, “Take up as many of these schemes as you can and invest the cash and when they come for you, at least you invested the cash.”

David Hossein: Well, they’ll come for you plus interest and penalties and the penalties can be 100% of the tax sometimes, so it has to be a really good investment, put it that way.

Prav Soulanki: You just touched upon, I think Payman asked the question, is what one thing do you wish a dentist could do and the one thing that I often come across is a dentist will get their year end accounts, they’ll glaze over it and they won’t understand it and they’ll nod their heads and they’ll say, “Just give me the bad news, how much tax do I have to pay?” But they really don’t understand the numbers and whatnot and I think a lot of it comes down to the way it’s explained by a lot of people in your position, who just assume terminology is commonplace across borders and whatnot, do you know what I mean?

Prav Soulanki: So I think that’s one thing that I think certainly from your perspective, when I’ve been speaking to you, I have found that you dumb things down for me and that’s helped me understand things better for sure, and I think that’s key but then just one other thing you touched upon when you said practise owners when they dispose of a practise and they realise that the fruits of their hard work over the years, is how do they deal with that huge injection of money, that lump sum? Especially if they’re later on in life, coming towards last 20 years of their life and whatnot and maybe they’ve been the sort of people who don’t spend money and are not going to spend that money in their lifetime. Any tips for inheritance tax and structures and things like that? I know you’re not an IFA or whatever, but just some general sort of things that people often, once again, have conversations, we’ve said this. I can’t advise them on this sort of stuff, so point them in various directions but is there anything you can do from that point of view? I look at it from this point of view and think, “I’ve been working all my life, I’ve paid tax on all that income,” you sell your business, you pay tax again and then you pop your clogs and they get another-

David Hossein: They take 40%, yeah.

Prav Soulanki: … they get another stab at it as well, and well, I don’t want that to happen. Are there any bits of advice you can give?

David Hossein: Advice that it has to be very specific to first of all, do you have kids in the first place? Are you married? How much do you need for yourself? You’re right, passing on … In some ways you look at it and suddenly, you’re 60, 60, 65, you’ve just sold your practise for £2 million, now you’ve got £2 million cash. If you die the next day, you’re going to get 40% bill on it, whereas if you would have held and passed it down to your kids and if they were dentists, let’s say, there would have been zero tax on it because it was a business that you passed on.

David Hossein: So you really have to map back and say, “Well, okay, how much do I need for my retirement? What do I want to do with that money?” I’ve got clients who’ve gone and bought a golf course and if that’s what you want to do, go and do that but once you know how much you need then it’s, “Okay, the rest, where do I want it to go?” Then you’re into thinking about your kids, if your kid is a dentist as well, “Should I help them buy a dental practise?” That’s a business to have, so it’s just seeing what’s right for your circumstances, or is it grandkids, “Do I want to put money into a trust for my grandkids?” There’s so much involved in that situation, it’s very hard to give one answer for it.

Prav Soulanki: Let’s assume it was just cash, let’s assume you haven’t got a business, you’re a training company or something like that, and you’ve just got cash for example, like you just mentioned, that dentists who’s got £2 million with cash or whatever, what would you advise them to do? Seek advice from a … who? What type of person?

David Hossein: I think your IFA, if you’re not interested … I think first question is, have you had enough? Are you out of it now? Have you got any energy left to do a business? If the answer is no, then it’s, well if it’s not going to be a business, could it be an investment in another business, because that’s the halfway point between well actually now I’ve got something that’s fully an investment. So fully-owned business, partially-owned investment in an unlisted company, because that qualifies for business property relief, or am I sick of all that and I’m going to go into properties, investments and trust. Depending on which category you fall in, if you’re in the category of investments, then have your accountant talk with your IFA, and see what they are advising you in the returns involved there and how that impacts on your estate.

Payman Langroud…: Cash, no? You can gift cash seven years before you die.

David Hossein: You can yeah, you’ve got lifetime gifts you can make.

Payman Langroud…: Yeah, I’ll set my alarm for that date. It’s been an interesting chat man, what do you do outside of accountancy?

David Hossein: Well, I’ve got three kids so I spend a lot of time with the family, enjoy that. We try and get out, we’re very lucky to live near some fields here so we try and get out as much as we can, walking. I like to hike when I can, when I can get away, like to go for a hike and that sort of stuff. And food, I like my food.

Payman Langroud…: Do you cook?

David Hossein: Yeah. Yeah, yeah I cook. My wife’s a good cook but I like cooking as well.

Prav Soulanki: What’s your favourite cuisine?

David Hossein: Steak.

Payman Langroud…: Me too, man. Prav likes to end it on his traditional questions, I don’t know if you’ve ever heard this podcast before David, but Prav likes to make our guest cry.

Prav Soulanki: [crosstalk] David, but look, I’ve got a few questions and it just taps into the person behind the voice really, so imagine it was your last day on the planet, you had your kids around you and you had to leave them with three pieces of wisdom, words of advice, call it what you want, what would they be?

David Hossein: Be honest, truth is important, work hard, because anything worth doing is usually hard work and find something that you enjoy, to make it worthwhile.

Payman Langroud…: Nice.

Prav Soulanki: Very nice. How would you like to be remembered? So, “David was … ”

David Hossein: I suppose, “There for me when I needed him.”

Prav Soulanki: Nice. Now, imagine you got a month left to live and you know you’ve got a month left, you’ve got your health and everything in place but you know you’ve got 30 days, what you going to do with that 30 days? Please don’t say, “Look at another spreadsheet.”

Payman Langroud…: He’s going to first of all look at his inheritance tax situation.

David Hossein: Well yeah, I’d do that quickly. I’d probably go to Everest mate, probably try and-

Prav Soulanki: Would you?

David Hossein: Yeah, I’d want to go and … I’ve never been, I’d love to go see the end of the world, that’d be nice.

Prav Soulanki: Nice. David, it’s been an absolute pleasure, I think there’s lots of advice and that’s come out there. If people want to get in touch with you after this and just maybe speak to you and get some advice, is there an easy way to connect with you?

David Hossein: Yeah, so my email address, my website, bennettbrooks.co.uk. I’m on Facebook, I’m on LinkedIn. Yeah, google me.

Payman Langroud…: All right mate, thanks a lot, lovely to meet you.

Prav Soulanki: Thanks David.

David Hossein: All right, cheers guys.

Speaker 2: This is Dental Leaders, the podcast where you get to go one-one-one with emerging leaders in dentistry. Your hosts, Payman Langroudi and Prav Soulanki.

Prav Soulanki: Thanks for listening guys. If you’ve 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’ve had to say and what our guest has had to say because I’m assuming that you got some value out of it.

Payman Langroud…: If you did get some value out of it, think about subscribing and if you would share this with a friend, who you think might get some value out of it too. Thank you so, so, so much for listening, thanks.

Prav Soulanki: And don’t forget our six star rating.