It’s already September. The kids are back in school. Summer vacations are over, and everyone is following their schedule for the new season. The year will end in just a few months, so it’s the perfect time to really evaluate where you are now and think honestly about what your vision is for your life and your practice.
How closely does your current reality match that vision?
Let’s do a quick test and rate them together using a scale of 1 to 10. You’re the only one who will see this, so be honest with your responses.
Give yourself a 1 if you feel completely incompetent, negligent, or nonexistent, and you wake up every day disgusted with the practice you have to walk into. Right now, you may feel this way about your finances, team members, patients, your dentistry, or just your life outside of your practice in general.
Give yourself a 10 if you think you are a “Rock Star.” This means perfection or the ideal state. With this score, you believe that you couldn’t possibly consider changing anything from where it is now. Your life and practice are exactly the way you want them every day. You’re earning what you expect, working the amount of time you want, and you have all the peace you could possibly ask for.
This means that this ranking scale goes from a state where there is absolutely nothing you want to keep (you just want to blow it up and start over) to a state where you don’t want to change anything.
Where are you on this scale?
Just think about yourself in the process. Remember, life is never about what you’ve achieved. It’s about the potential of what could be. That’s how people think who sacrifice and invest in themselves and their future.
Now, if you already give yourself a 10, just stop reading this article and move on with your day. Not because you’re already perfect; we both know that’s not possible. Stop, because it’s clear you aren’t critical enough, and you are most certainly settling for far less than is possible in your practice.
It’s one thing to be happy, but another to be so content that you lack ambition and, therefore, purpose.
Okay. Go ahead and pick your rating now.
Where Am I?
What number did you pick?
How do you feel about your choice? If it makes you feel better, know that very few dentists say they have total control over their outcomes. Very few are creating deliberate growth and have a plan they use to guide their practice forward.
I’m talking about a career plan that begins with the lifestyle you want to have and uses other elements to create that lifestyle, such as dentistry, budget, wealth building, profit, expenses, practice growth, team building, and schedule.
These are the key pillars that support your practice as a business, and if you don’t plan them out, orchestrate them, deliberately design them, or create a reason why things happen and a cause-and-effect to get the results you desire, or if your goals are not met and your time is devalued, at some point you will end up frustrated. You’ll find yourself behind in time and money and blocked by your team or, even worse, your patients.
I don’t say this to scare you. I say it because this is reality.
Successful people call this realization “healthy paranoia.” Recognizing and embracing your own inner sense of “healthy paranoia” is the first step to making those changes you know deep down need to be made. After all, you can choose to be just like some of your patients and live in a state of denial, waiting until a problem is so bad that it has to be addressed. Or you can be a smart, responsible businessperson and prevent failures and get ahead of issues before they escalate.
I call this the optimal state of ideal—on purpose. It sounds magical, but it’s possible to achieve.
You know that changes are necessary. Now, it’s a matter of taking responsibility to make them happen and get exactly what you want in life, out of your practice, in dentistry, with your team, and from your patients.
And here I make no apologies. It will take effort, but anything worth doing is worth doing right, right?
It’s about taking the time to plan so that you can have a business on purpose, do dentistry on purpose, practice on purpose, schedule on purpose, lead your team on purpose, diagnose on purpose, have fun on purpose…and best of all…get rich on purpose!
When you write your own definition for success, plan accordingly, and take action, you can choose how much you make and what your overall lifestyle looks like. However, most will short-change themselves, not because they want to, but because they lack confidence, belief, and a structured process that leads to the results they deserve.
How much of this are you doing on purpose now?
How much are you guided by the goals, mission, passion, and profits that make up your life’s purpose?
It’s time to make a change. Stop just “taking what you can get.” Instead, design an experience, practice, and message to cultivate exactly what you want without excuses. It doesn’t matter where you are or if you’re talking about implants, dentures, scaling, surgery, or something else. You can find whatever dentistry you want to do in every city in America.
The question is, are you doing anything about it or just taking what falls into your lap?
Why not create the kind of practice that invigorates you? Wouldn’t it be nice to wake up each morning and look forward to going to the office? How about being so proud of your practice that you stand with your head up and your voice strong?
It’s September. The year will be over soon. Now is the time to plan for change and take action. It’s time for a practice that allows you to look into the eyes of your patients, team, family, friends, and associates and declare your conviction and belief in what you are doing to help other people.
More insights on making positive change a reality in the future…
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Recognized by thousands of dentists across North America, Scott J. Manning, MBA, is an accomplished author (“The Dental Practice Shift” is the #1 most requested book in dentistry) and highly-sought-after public speaker. For almost two decades, he has dedicated his life to inspiring and motivating dentists worldwide to create wealth and lifestyle-based practices. Today, when he is not sharing his positive messages worldwide, he loves to travel and spend time with his beloved wife Kristen and daughter Saylor.
To learn more, visit https://dentalsuccesstoday.com/.
FEATURED IMAGE CREDIT: Tafilah Yusof from Pixabay.
