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EPISODE 130: Mistakes I Made as a Young Dentist with Dr. David Rice

Casey and Jarrod are joined by special guest Dr. David Rice, founder of IgniteDDS, to discuss his career path as a successful dental practice owner and how he initially came about the business wrongfully. He teaches young dentists ways to get on a successful path early.

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EPISODE 130 TRANSCRIPTION

Announcer:
Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Millionaire Dentist Podcast, brought to you by Four Quadrants Advisory. On this podcast, we break down the world of dentistry finances and business practices to help you become the millionaire dentist you deserve to be. Please be advised, we do speak with an honest tongue, and may not be safe for work.

Casey Hiers:
Hello and welcome. This is Casey Hiers, back at the Millionaire Dentist Podcast in studio with co-host, Jarrod Bridgeman.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Hey, good afternoon.

Casey Hiers:
It's not just us today, pal. We've got a special guest.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
I know. I'm really excited.

Casey Hiers:
Dr. David Rice is joining us. David is the founder of the nation's largest student and new dentist community, IgniteDDS. He travels, he speaks, he writes, and he's really pouring into the dental industry, especially with young dentists. This is what I love. He maintains a restorative and implant practice in East Amherst, New York. 25 years experience is a pretty good foundation to pour into some young folks. David, thanks for joining us.

David Rice:
Hey, thanks for having me guys. Appreciate it.

Casey Hiers:
I'm very curious about a whole bunch of things, but let's start with this. You went to dental school. Were you an associate for a little bit?

David Rice:
I did. I went to dental school. I did a residency right out of school. And then, I had a massive failure of an associateship, and then kind of a so-so associateship before I found a great one, and then the practice that I ended up buying.

Casey Hiers:
How many years were you an associate?

David Rice:
About two-and-a-half years.

Casey Hiers:
Okay. Then you said, "Hey, it's time to buy a practice," and boom, you looked up and had that bonus job of practice ownership.

David Rice:
You know what? It's been the best decision I've ever made.

Casey Hiers:
Nice. That's good. There's a variety of topics I want to cover today, but talk about the journey from, you're a practice-owning dentist, restorative and implant practice, which tells me that you love dentistry. You sharpen your skills, you're learning how to do different procedures and really serve your patients well. Talk to me about the origin and the inspiration to give back, to start IgniteDDS.

David Rice:
Sure. I've always been a teacher at heart, and from day one, moving back to the Western New York area after my residency, I always taught part-time at Buffalo's dental school. And for me it was a means of, one, giving back, and two, quite honestly, getting better myself. It forced me to think about things that lots of times, maybe more seasoned dentists get on autopilot. We pick up the same handpiece and the same verse, the same thing. So I figured out early on that it was as much a win for bettering myself as it was for bettering the next generation. And short story is, after doing that for a bunch of years, I thought it would be really cool to teach all over the United States and North America. And my then associate had some big things happen in life that were kind of shocking and unfortunate and unavoidable, and I had to leave teaching the dental school for a little while. And I missed it. And between missing it and wanting control over how I taught, where I taught, that was the impetus for Ignite.

Casey Hiers:
Buffalo. Are you a Bills fan, were you a bills fan, and have you finally gotten past those three Super Bowls in the nineties?

David Rice:
I will tell you, you can take the boy out of Buffalo, but I'm still a Bill's fan at heart. It was four years in a row we lost, so I'm going to add one on top of your three.

Casey Hiers:
I was cooking the books for you.

David Rice:
You were cooking them in a good way. I will tell you this though. Our very first full year in St. Petersburg, Florida, a guy named Tom Brady got to be the Tampa Bay Bucs quarterback, and we won the Super Bowl. So it just washed all the badness away.

Casey Hiers:
Well, and I certainly just heard you say we. "We won the Super Bowl." Good man.

David Rice:
Wherever my feet are, that's a victory.

Casey Hiers:
Hey, geography is an acceptable origin story for fandom in my book. Well, going back to education, I see that you've completed curriculums at Spear, Pankey, Dawson, and my favorite, the school of hard knocks, but it sounds like education learning and then teaching has just always been a part of you. How do you balance out that itch within the dentistry that you enjoy that's the cornerstone of your success?

David Rice:
It's been an evolution for me. In the beginning, I was almost all clinical care with patients, with a little bit of teaching. And then over the course of time, it went from 90% 10. To 80 20, 70 30, 50 50. And today I fly back from St. Pete, Florida to East Amherst New York, and I see patients every other month for a week. So I am about 95% education, IgniteDDS mentorship, and 5% clinical practice. But that five percent's really important, because I need to stay on top of technology and materials, and working with team, or everything I teach is irrelevant.

Casey Hiers:
Well, it speaks to credibility. You're doing and teaching, which is really good. So it looks like top young dentist, that's kind of the focus. From your perspective, as you're mentoring and speaking with and interacting with these folks, what are a couple of the common questions or struggles that they share with you, or that you are encountering?

David Rice:
I would say the number one, and this one is number one by a landslide, is their debt. Students are rolling out of school today, I'm going to say almost minimum 300,000, with a big chunk of them rolling out mid-fours to mid 500,00, 550 in debt. And it's impacting their choices. Some of that is reality. Obviously, some of them have limited options because of that data and their family structure and geography. And for a lot of others, it's really perception. So a lot of what we work with when we're talking with young folks is, what really is an obstacle? What feels like an obstacle? And then either way, how do we show them objective pathways to success so they can overcome?

Casey Hiers:
Debt is emotional and it's tough. We have some folks we work with, long story short, in the state of Florida, but when both of them are dentists, and when you add up the student loans, practice loans, equipment loans, it was a daunting number, to the point where they would inquire with the Florida Dental Association from the state perspective, and just making an inquiry. And they're like, "Yeah, we don't really have anything for you." And that can really just stunt, just freeze people up. It's incredibly stressful.
It's real, but some of it, the bogeyman. You made a statement earlier. Some of it is perceived and some is real, but some of it is just what they feel. Probably convoluted with that question, but when it comes to debt, what advice do you give young people?

David Rice:
I will tell you, and this has been my experience for the last 28 years or so, is your fastest path to debt elimination is owning something. Owning some kind of business. And heck, you went to dental school, so it could be a good idea to own a dental practice. And with that, this is my biggest mistake, I did it the wrong way, which is why I really share what I share today. Pay minimum payments, get cash-flush, be attractive to lenders, so you can own a dental practice as quickly as possible, and then pound your debt down.

Casey Hiers:
I like that. So the opposite of what Dave Ramsey's book is about?

David Rice:
A hundred percent the opposite of what Dave Ramsey speaks about.

Casey Hiers:
And I'm with you, because I hear that so often. And I've read his book. I met him. He signed my book. For, let's call them commoners or civilians, hey, there's some good strategy there, but for practice-owning dentists who own a seven-digit entity, just erasing debt and have a singular focus, does many dentists that disservice. Sounds like you're of that mind as well.

David Rice:
I am. And I'm a living, breathing example. So picture, I'm in my late twenties, I literally in three years eliminated my student debt, pounded every penny towards it. I also bought a home. I was also at the time married to a physician, which meant I could make $0 per year and pour every penny back into the practice, yet, despite all of those things, in the eyes of a lender, I was a questionable lend, because I didn't have assets that they wanted. A bank doesn't want to take your dental practice from you. They don't want to take your house away from you. That's work. But if you've got 10% of the value of that practice in the bank, that actually means something. And in today's world, if you check all the boxes, the right lender's never going to even take that 10%. They just need to know it's there. So I did it backwards. Get cash-flush, buy a practice, then go buy personal property, and pay you off your student debt. Revolver debt's a totally different thing. Like credit card debt, all that stuff. Don't have any of that. Don't get doctor-itis and go out there and buy a Ferrari and a boat and a 4,500 square-foot house. Those are bad decisions, and that's bad debt. But your student loan debt, to your point, the bogeyman, it's not bad debt. It's going to make you millions of dollars over the course of your career.

Casey Hiers:
Why do you think so many young dentists are scared to death of it?

David Rice:
The most honest answer, and there'll be some people who don't like this answer, is DSOs spend bank going into school after school after school, framing the story to convince young dentists that they need to be a part of a big group. Now I'm not opposed to a DSO, and heck, if you don't want to be an owner or you don't want to necessarily settle down geographically right away, then a DSO probably is a really great option for you. But don't believe the story, because the story benefits the storyteller.

Casey Hiers:
Well put.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Yeah.

Casey Hiers:
We like to call ourselves the DSO kryptonite. Again, for some people in some situations, it's a fantastic option, but they're sweeping regions and areas, and you might be able to shed some light on this. There's a little bit of fear with the young and the old. Nobody's going to want to buy your practice. Let me dangle this check in front of you and take it. And I don't want to go the direction of trashing DSOs, because again, there's a place for them, and it can help a lot of people. But to the masses, it seems like they have wreaked some havoc in dentistry. Is that an overstatement?

David Rice:
I think what concerns me about the story tell, and it's not just DSOs, there's a lot of storytellers who are out there taking advantage of people, so it's not just them. But the model doesn't bother me. It's when people don't tell a hundred percent of the story. So give everybody all the objective facts, and let people make the best choices for them. And there's some really strong regional DSOs that are dentist-owned that do that really, really well. And I'm a fan. I think that's a model that's going to continue to grow. It's going to take over the solo practice model for sure in the next seven years. But when VC dollars come into play, then as a dentist, it behooves you to ask great questions, and get the right answers and the full story.

Casey Hiers:
Sorry to give you a pop quiz. I do this when I present CE. Do you think it's easier for a practice owner to sell to a younger dentist or to corporate dentistry?

David Rice:
It depends. I'm going to say it's going to be based on how solidified their systems they are, and how productive they are. I think in today's world, a DSO, big or small, that's worth its salt is looking for a highly productive practice with pretty good systems or excellent systems. So the days are gone for the most part where you haven't done things very well and can sell it to anybody. However, if you have those things going for you, then you've got a stacked deck, and you're in a win-win position to sell to whomever you like.

Casey Hiers:
A plus, brother. Perfectly put. I was in a large group and I got asked that question. It felt a little loaded. And I turned it over to the crowd, and I said, "Would anybody like to take a stab at it?" And then an older gentleman raised his hand, and he said, "Well, I've just sold to that. I was supposed to stay for X amount of time. Didn't make it six months." Didn't recommend it. But I asked the person why they asked it, and they said, "Well, I just sold out as well, and I'm just regretting it." And I said, "Well," to your point of systems, "If your practice has 75% overhead and the financials are boom, boom, boom, boom, it's much easier to sell to corporate dentistry." The younger dentist will line up when you have like you said, systems and processes in place, overhead in the fifties, you can show in financials, the income that can be made, and all of those things, you're plan with a stacked deck. Well put. And I put you on the spot with that, but boy, that aligns with what we think here as well.

David Rice:
Yeah. I feel like it's a seller's market right now if you have done a reasonable job over the years, building something to sell.

Casey Hiers:
Yeah. Well put. Our goal is simple. We build better dentists. I read that on the website. General question, but get into that a little bit for me, what are some pillars that help build better dentists, and the mentorship? And just the knowledge and experience, for sure, but dive into that a little bit for me.

David Rice:
Absolutely. I think when I first started dentistry, all I had to be was a pretty darn good dentist and a normal human. Today, you need to have strong clinical skills, you need to have strong leadership skills, and you need to have strong business skills. So those three pillars are where we focus when we work with young dentists. And we drive them to educate themselves in those three main lanes, every single day,

Casey Hiers:
Clinical leadership and business. Love that. Yeah. What do you think prevents some practice owners from not excelling in those areas over the course of a career?

David Rice:
First one, probably fear. I think it's the same fear when you come out of school, but it's fear of failure. So boy, it's going to take time and money for me to invest and get better in one, two or all three lanes. And what if I invest and it doesn't pan out? Now I'm in trouble. So fear is a big one. This one, some of you are listening are not going to like, but it's the truth. Laziness. You're lazy. If you want better, you have to be better. And I think as humans, we like the path of least resistance, but nobody who's ever made it in the world took the path of least resistance unless they inherited it from mom and dad. So those are the two biggies for me.

Casey Hiers:
Well, and those folks typically have another set of hurdles to overcome, but yeah.

David Rice:
That's a true story.

Casey Hiers:
Well put. I want to dig in a little more to understand, on the IgniteDDS, we've got the online academy, the continuing education, the study club, the fast track, and the mentorship. Would you just kind touch on those a little bit?

David Rice:
Sure. The online academy, we built for one reason. I'm a raving fan of Pankey, Dawson, Kois and Spear. I think they provide incredible clinical education for people. What we've experienced over the last decade of Ignite is, there are a lot of young dentists who can't write that check yet. So we wanted to build a space that bridged the gap, where we could bring in faculty from all of those places, as well as faculty from some other strong institutions, and say, "Hey, if you're not ready for the 301 and the 401 lesson, let's make sure you own the 101 and the 201. And we can do that at a price point that is easy for you." And then the other side of it was, we know our young dentists and our students today, they want to learn on their own timetable. So to build a non-demand place that's very Netflix in nature.
A course might be an hour or two hours or three, but it's very much moduled in five to 15-minute increments. And fully automated, so if you want to come and watch five minutes and come back and watch 10, and come back and watch 20, and it takes you a week to finish the course, no big deal. Drops you right back in just like Netflix or Prime would, automate your quiz, automate your CV. Easy peasy, fully interactive, back and forth, which I also love, so people can anonymously ask all the questions that they want without ever feeling like I'm going to ask something somebody thinks I should already know, and therefore I'm not going to ask it. So I love that for us and for young docs, and even for a top 10% student who says, "Hey, I want to get ahead of the curve." The study club piece sort of levels that up. And we have them both for young dentists as well as for dental students. And they are largely virtual. They're run on a national basis. We by design, do not put dentists in the same club who live in the same city, because what I've learned when I was in that room is, people don't always tell all the goodness that they could to help their fellow dentists because they're worried it might help their practice. You want to believe we're all totally altruistic. It's just not the case. So we've got one mentor with maximum 15 dentists who are from all over the country.
And everybody's willing to share because they might live 1500 miles from each other. So everybody succeeds together, as opposed to one person's success, feeling like it could negatively impact yours. And those two pieces have been awesome for us to see young dentists just accelerate. And then when they're ready, two, three, five, six years later, and they say, "Well, where should I go next?" I'm like, go to Pankey, Dawson, Spear, Kois. Go get that clinical education. And on the business side, similar pillar on the leadership side, similar pillar. And we connect them to the right people when they're ready.

Casey Hiers:
Love that. Yeah. It's less threatening if they don't view them as your competition across the street or down the road. I'm glad you mentioned that because it's a very real thing within the local study clubs, which there's value in, but people certainly hold their cards a little close to their chest in those meetings sometimes.

David Rice:
Yeah. And I think it's foolish for us to say we're not in competition with each other. Yes, you are. Of course, you are. It doesn't mean you can't be friends, but absolutely, if your business is going to win, and your next door to me, and that means mine's going to lose, I'm going to make sure I'm winning. So it's silly for us to pretend that that doesn't happen in life.

Casey Hiers:
Right. Switching gears a little bit. Many of our listeners, they own a practice, but just hearing your focus, what are younger dentists who maybe are associates or want to be associates or looking for associateships, as an older practice owner, maybe wanting to bring on the right associate, from your perspective, what are they looking for? What could separate a practice owner who's maybe got up to a million six, two million, wants that associate, what are they looking for?

David Rice:
A few things. They are, I'm going to say first and foremost, looking for a practice that can actually supply them with a healthy patient schedule. Not to be overburdened, but that there are enough patients there, there's enough opportunity for growth that they can support themselves and pay those loans down. That's like a safety and a security and a, hey, what I've gone to school for my whole life, so I really want that. The second element that's really, really important, and is a major differentiator is, if you can do number one and then you can throw in some mentorship, you're almost unstoppable because everybody claims that they want to be a mentor, but there are very few practices that actually sit down on a regular basis with their associates and say, "Hey, how's it going? What's going well? Where can I help? Let's look at some of your patients. Let me show you some of mine." People who are really willing to teach them the clinical, the leadership, and the business.
And hey, if you're an owner and you're not strong in two of those three categories, then focus on the one you've got strength in. And maybe this is a really cool opportunity to learn another one of those lanes, a second lane, with somebody younger. So you'll learn it faster, and they'll feel really good about learning something with you in addition to learning it from you. So those are the two biggest things. And I think if there's a third, it's just maybe the comprehension that there are really, really talented and hardworking young dentists out there. So if you are not finding them, please reach out to me. We don't broker. We just like connecting great people together. And I always liken this to when you're younger, and you go to that high school dance, and you're afraid to ask somebody because you think they're going to say no, and they're afraid you're not going to ask. So that's where we are in dentistry right now. There's seasoned dentists who feel there's no young dentist who really can fit the bill. And there's young dentists saying, "There's no seasoned dentists who want me." So I think those are the three biggies.

Casey Hiers:
That first one kind of resonated, having enough patience and enough production. I know we see it all the time where practice owners want an associate way too early, or when the timing, the patients, the production and the overhead do not equal. You need one, but they want to go on vacation and know there's production going on. And sometimes that singular emotion gets them to bring them on too soon. And it varies. But for us we feel like, listen, if you're not at 1.3, 1.4 in collections, you're not really even in the ballpark to look at it. What are your thoughts on that?

David Rice:
I entirely agree. I think like most things and most people in life, we do it for all the right reasons, but we make emotional choices instead of logical choices. And then we rationalize them afterwards because of that vacation. So yeah, I would agree if you're not over 1.2, 1.3, you're probably not ready unless you are seeking to cut your time in half and bring somebody in who is going to be an associate to a partner, slash an owner, ASAP.

Casey Hiers:
Yeah. That message needs to be out there more. I'm surprised sometimes at successful dentists and seemingly sharp people, that they get a million and they just think it's time for an associate. And it can wreck them. It can set them back five years, but that's not talked about much. And there's so many variables that go into it. But I appreciated you saying that. Well, number one, is there enough food for everybody? And for some reason, that's not looked at enough.

David Rice:
I totally agree.

Casey Hiers:
David, anything else from your perspective and through your lens of practicing dentist in New York to business owner in the dental industry, just overall? I want to open the floor up to you to give us a parting shot.

David Rice:
I think overall, aside from what we shared already, the number one quality I see in the most successful dentists I've ever met, is vulnerability. Whether that is the admission that my practice is doing pretty good, but I'd like it to be doing a whole lot better. Instead of staying in those four glass walls, get out there, ask the right questions. Of course, ask them of the right people. But being vulnerable, being vulnerable with your team. We don't need to know everything. We're not supposed to know everything. And I've learned over the years that the best teams from a culture standpoint, as well as from a productivity standpoint, are the teams where the dentist owner might come in and say like, "Hey, here's a concept. Let's talk about it."
I've been stunned in such a good way at all the teams I've come in contact with over the years, whether it's been one of my practices or a practice I've gone into to coach for a short period of time, we get so much smarter when we start engaging everybody at the table, instead of believing that we're supposed to have all the answers. So I would just encourage everyone who's listening, to get vulnerable. And not only will you benefit from it, this giant weight will be lifted from your shoulders. And then the third win in it all of it is, happiness, the whole happiness. You can make all the money in the world, but if you're not happy... So happiness factor, and realizing, this is something somebody taught me when I was a kid, and it's totally unnecessary to try to know it all.

Casey Hiers:
Well, you hit on some real good pearls there. And we all want to be successful and have financial freedom, but there's a lot of people with a lot of money who don't have that third thing that you mentioned, which is happiness, and that vulnerability. As a practice owner, asking your team and staff to weigh in and genuinely wanting to hear from them, versus a gotcha kind of question, boy, that can really help a culture tremendously.

David Rice:
For sure. Yeah. You look at what's going on today. Biggest problem in dentistry today for the last two years and probably for the next two, is team turnover. It's expensive, it's stressful. You can eliminate that in a heartbeat.

Casey Hiers:
And you just set the ingredients to eliminate it. It's interesting, pre-COVID, we would hear people complain about team or staff. Now it's a little more real, because there's some harder times getting the right people, but you just hit the ingredients on how to overcome that. And you said something else really interesting, quote-unquote, pretty good. There's a lot of practice owners out there that, they settle and they're okay with, I'll be all right. I'm doing pretty good. And to me, that's like nails on a chalkboard, to be pretty good, to your point. Clinical leadership and business, there's areas to grow, which one can you use help with? And then seek out those resources. You've done that over your career, and the fruits of your labor show that.

David Rice:
Yeah, thank you. I've always been a fan of, be the least intelligent person at every table you sit at, and just learn, learn, learn. It wasn't that hard for me, of course, but you sit at some really cool tables and meet some interesting people, and you leapfrog all the other folks who are pretending to have all the answers. And I totally understand that, because I was that guy as a young dentist, and I needed to sit at a few tables and realize that people want to help. Good people really do want to help.

Casey Hiers:
And having that self-awareness, having the confidence in yourself to be vulnerable, those are important skills. Dr. David Rice, thank you so much. Jared, where can our listeners learn more?

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Ignitedds.com. That's a good place to start. David, if they're looking to sign up, can they just go on any time and sign up, and not have to worry about a semester start or anything like that?

David Rice:
Absolutely. At any time. And if anyone has any questions at all, please feel free just to reach out and connect directly to me. This is my favorite thing to do in life, and I'm really happy to help.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
And I liked what you said about not being the smartest person at the table, because that's how I live my life, so that's good to know. Well, thank you, David. Once again, I really appreciate you being on here. And again, folks, check out ignitedds.com and start learning.

Announcer:
That's all the time we have today. Thank you to our guests for their insight, and for sharing some really great information. And thank you to you, the listener, for tuning in. The Millionaire Dennis podcast is brought to you by Four Quadrants Advisory. To see if they might be a good fit for you and your practice, go on over to fourquadrantsadvisory.com, and see why year after year, they retain over 95% of their clients. Thank you again for joining us, and we'll see you next time.