9 min read

Why Most Dental CE Misses the Mark: What Really Moves the Needle

Picture of Four Quadrants Advisory Four Quadrants Advisory Updated on August 6, 2026

business of dentistry
Why Most Dental CE Misses the Mark: What Really Moves the Needle
In this episode, Casey and Jarrod pull back the curtain on their upcoming Orlando CE event—and why it’s nothing like the typical “one-tip” dental courses most doctors are used to. From a Ritz-Carlton venue to real talk about cashflow, overhead, and the hidden pitfalls of practice ownership, they share what makes this CE stand out and why so many dentists leave saying, “How did you know all of that about my practice?”

With humor, honesty, and behind-the-scenes stories, they explain the camaraderie, the breakthroughs, and the uncomfortable-but-necessary truths that help dentists finally gain control of the business side of dentistry. If you’ve ever wondered why clinical CE hasn’t solved your stress, this episode gives you a preview of the event that actually does.

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:
Casey, how are you?

Casey Hiers:
Sweater collection's on point, man.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Thank you. Thank you. I'm a big fan of sweaters, and I'm glad it's getting chillier outside because I can get to break them out.

Casey Hiers:
Sweaters, I'm about to dust mine off.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Casey, next week you're going to be heading to Orlando, and that's Florida, by the way, for those of you that don't know, riding to Orlando, Florida, and you're going to be presenting some EC. Can you walk me through about our CE course in general?

Casey Hiers:
Webster's dictionary defines CE as continuing education. I can tell you why dentists and specialists tell me they come.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Okay.

Casey Hiers:
And yeah, this one, what's the name of it? Highball & Harvest at the Ritz-Carlton.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Right.

Casey Hiers:
I mean, number one, people come, and this is in no particular order, we have it at kick ass Places for sure. Highball & Harvest at the Orlando Ritz-Carlton, we're not messing around. This is a fantastic venue, and we like to do that. I mean, we've got some things coming up in 2024. We might be bottling our own bourbon with a label. I mean, we're going next level, but-

Jarrod Bridgeman:
We want something that's nice, but something that's also still somewhat original, really nice and original. You know what I mean?

Casey Hiers:
Yeah. I mean, when we pick venues, I want it to be someplace where if we have a client that lives there, and I mentioned this to them, they go, "Oh yeah, that's one of the best spots ever. We went there for our anniversary last year." That's our goal, number one. And so people are going to go because it's going to be somewhere that's nice. It's comfortable. It's not... I don't want to make fun of any restaurant.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Sure.

Casey Hiers:
But we like to have it a nice venue. Ultimately, I have sat in on a lot of dental CE. When I go to courses and present, I'll slide in different places, if I'm not at the cabana, and there's so much of it, and so much of it, it's one idea. It's just very basic. Our chief operations officer has done the same thing. There's also some really, really good CE, don't get me wrong, but there's so much out there, it's hard to discern what's worth your time. I will tell you what past people have told us. They've said things like, "This topic probably matters to my family, my legacy, and my money and retirement more than anything I've heard," yet I don't get a lot of this.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Well, what is the topic?

Casey Hiers:
How to master the business side of dentistry. How to understand that most CEOs in the country are also not the primary producers.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Correct.

Casey Hiers:
In dentistry, you are the CEO, you wear at least five other C-level executive hats, and you are also the primary producer. It's kind of a raw deal, and dentistry's great, but a lot of young dentists do not understand practice ownership is really, really challenging. You can be terrible at it and still make $300,000 a year in dentistry. We've seen people make six or $700,000 in dentistry and not be very good at the business... Actually, maybe 920 might be somebody coming in, going, "Help."

Jarrod Bridgeman:
But comparatively, if they had already been with us, how much of that would've been? How much of that would've changed?

Casey Hiers:
Oh, we play that game all the time.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Yeah.

Casey Hiers:
I mean, it's a huge number, but the point is there's a lot of CE out there. A lot of times, the place will get somebody's attention, but the ones I like the most are the ones that come for the subject matter. They recognize it. They go, "Man, I'm successful, but I feel like I've hit a plateau in a lot of this cashflow insurance overhead."

Jarrod Bridgeman:
They've done it to the best of their abilities and don't know what to do next.

Casey Hiers:
Yeah. So the people that see that subject matter on the business side of dentistry and go, "Yeah, I want to go there." But one of the other ones you mentioned before we started recording, amongst our peers, because at study clubs, there's peacocking and posturing and posing and-

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Is it because they kind of know each other enough to

Casey Hiers:
They're kind of competitors.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Yeah.

Casey Hiers:
This one's a little different. Our events, I feel like there is a camaraderie amongst the attendees because they don't all know-know each other. Some of them do, but they're familiar with each other, so that's nice. I've had pediatric dentists or specialists actually do some referral work on the before and after, which kudos-

Jarrod Bridgeman:
A little bit of networking.

Casey Hiers:
I love that. And so it's interesting when they look around the room. They're trying to see are these people like me? And while the practices can be different and the situations can be different, ultimately, they are like you because they recognize that this is a huge challenge. They've had enough clinical CE or one-trick pony CE that they're all kind of in the same boat. But I say that, I also have had people that are almost giving up on dentistry because they can't-

Jarrod Bridgeman:
They may be on different levels of frustration.

Casey Hiers:
Yes, right.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Yeah. It's a good way to put it.

Casey Hiers:
Yeah. But ultimately, I mean, I've had people tell me, "Casey, it's like you've looked at all of my financials. How do you know?" Somebody recently, actually, as a podcast listener, goes, "It felt like the timing was unbelievable. Everything that I've been thinking about and worrying about and contemplating, you hit on, one after the other, to the point where I looked around and go, 'These must be paid actors and actresses, and this is really a setup for me because this is just dead bullseye.'" So again, we get to the heart of things, and it's intense.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
But it's intense, it's informative, it really makes you think. But also, it's not a total mental beatdown. We also include food and drink along with that as well, or golf, if it's at a-

Casey Hiers:
Well, it's like a good workout. It might hurt, but you're better because of it. I say that sometimes at the opening because I'm getting them ready, because some of them look like they've seen a ghost when I hit on some of this stuff. How did he know that? Well, we've been mastering it for 20 years. That's how we know it. I think I mentioned this earlier, but I had somebody go, "Are you a dentist?" And felt like a dentist added credibility to our subject matter, and I laughed. I said, "Well, no, dentists don't know how to do this. That would be like me trying to do dentistry right now."

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Right.

Casey Hiers:
And they weren't even a practice owner. That was the funny part. But no, we've been mastering this Four Quadrants Advisory, who has been doing it for a long time. We're in a growth mode.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
SO tell me, besides the venue, besides the networking, we've got the CE. Can you tell me, is there any other wow factors that you do that really, really wrap people into this event?

Casey Hiers:
I mean, it depends on what people are into. The best outcomes are the ones that they're crushing it. They've hit a plateau, and they go, "Casey, does your firm help this?" Because I try to make the CE about the problems and issues. I take off the Four Quadrant cape. But yeah, the best ones are the folks that go, "I would love to chat privately," and then ultimately go through a vetting process. We're not deciding to work together. We're deciding to engage in a process to see if we can help you buy millions of dollars. So those are the best outcomes, but sure, we're tasting bourbon, we're enjoying wonderful food. I mean, again, we're going to the best places to enjoy all their culinary delights. Most of the time, I just look at them because, as a presenter, I don't like to be on too full of a stomach, so I'm trying to play the martyr card here.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
You do your little snack beforehand.

Casey Hiers:
But no, and we're efficient. We're respectful of people's time. If we do a bourbon tasting, there's a bourbon raffle. Again, when we're doing heavy-hitting topics that cause work-life balance and relationship with kids and wives, money affects everything.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
I've been to a couple of your events when you're presenting, and I think a lot of people also appreciate the fact that you are timely and efficient, and that we start on time.

Casey Hiers:
Yeah. No, for the most part, we want to do that as well. But I don't know, we've got a handful of, I think, spots left. The cool thing is, we go to venues where it's pretty exclusive. There's only a few spots left. But for Orlando, I think we do have a handful left, so it's one of those things, simply click on a link, register. There's a $50 placeholder fully refunded once you attend. We had too many people saying they were going to come, that affected the venue size and a whole bunch of details. We didn't need a bunch of slapdicks from Facebook that weren't even dentists trying to come to our events or so-

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Or people... I know dentists get frustrated when they get no-shows.

Casey Hiers:
I have had people come to the events because they needed dental work. I've had an Amazon driver that said he delivers dental stuff. So I mean, I've seen a lot. This event is for, in a perfect world, practice owning dentists who are ready to go to the next step. But at minimum, dentists and specialists that have a-

Jarrod Bridgeman:
And by the way, spouses as well.

Casey Hiers:
Oh, sure.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
So bring your husband, bring your wife, bring whatever.

Casey Hiers:
Yeah. No, we love that. I mean, it has to do with dentistry, but it's how it affects your personal life, too.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
If they become a client of ours, the spouse plays a pretty important part of that.

Casey Hiers:
Well, here's the other thing. We're not selling timeshares. There may be one or two people that we end up helping in any room that we're in. We can't help everybody, so our business model doesn't lend to a quantity shop that we're just trying to get people "signed up". That's the opposite. We actually say no more than we say yes, but it does introduce us to nice new folks who may need some help.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
What's the worst-case scenario if a doc comes to one of our events?

Casey Hiers:
You get some free food, you meet some people in your industry, and you hear something that might be thought-provoking. Some people will get defensive because I've hit on something that's a nerve. So maybe somebody comes away a little bit irked, but ultimately if-

Jarrod Bridgeman:
The next day, though, they're like, "Shit, he was right."

Casey Hiers:
Well, if the emotional IQ and sort of the self-awareness is where it need to be, ultimately they're going to be like, "Yeah, that bothered me for a reason because I need to work on it." A lot of people get takeaways too, of these two things, I have now a more clear vision of what good or great looks like. So absolutely.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Well, and this is going to be November 9th, which is-

Casey Hiers:
Thursday.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Thursday of next week, which will be pretty exciting for you. I also know we have a really, really great place picked out in Phoenix as well.

Casey Hiers:
Scottsdale, to be precise, Olive & Ivy. That place rocks.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Yep, so that'll be a great one. And then after that, in December, we're going to be in Louisville, Kentucky.

Casey Hiers:
Louisville.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Louisville. Love it.

Casey Hiers:
But hey, listen, if you are interested in attending one of our events-

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Register, bring a friend, bring a spouse.

Casey Hiers:
That's right. Register as many people as you want to bust out those referrals for, and go to fourquadrantsadvisory.com/events, and you'll see all of our upcoming events. Click on them when you want to go to and fill out the form.

Jarrod Bridgeman:
Thanks, Casey.

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 Dentist 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.
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