Hard work pays off. And the hard work you’ve dedicated to graduating from dental school means you are ready to begin treating patients. Some recent graduates may start their own practice while others will join an existing, well-established dental practice.
Your first years of your dental career are to hone your craft (although, you will never stop learning). What comes after your first five years? What do you after you’ve improved your prep times? Where do you go after you have technical prowess has become beyond exceptional?
This is the time to think about where you want your career to go. While every dentist is different and has different goals, there is one dental practice transition every dental clinician must make in his career: going from clinician to owner.
Dental transitions are often misunderstood. A dental transition is the systematic process of transferring ownership of a dental practice to another at an agreed upon time in the future. It’s not a straightforward, immediate sale. A practice transition can be executed through a practice-growth strategy or an eventual strategy.
Because no two practices are the same, defining these strategies outright can be difficult. But the thing that’s important to understand is that dental transitions come with special challenges.
ACT Dental identified four primary challenges that come with dental transitions:
- When the business side of the practice takes priority, the clinical treatments take a nosedive.
- When the clinical side of the practice takes priority, the business aspect is on autopilot and can suffer neglect.
- Managing finances, staffing, scheduling, and production can be incredibly difficult to handle.
- Finding the time to formulate a strategy to ensure the smooth operation of the practice is difficult with a never-ending cycle of the day-today.
So many dentists have experienced this feeling of defeat. It’s okay. Aptus is a dental management company who can help make your transition easier, just as we’ve done for all our clients. Let’s start by sharing a very important tip on how to overcome these dental transition woes.
Transition into a leader. It’s one thing to become an owner and a manager. It’s quite another thing to become a leader. Learning to be a leader requires a lot of hard work, consistent evaluation, and the ability to be open to outside help. The Aptus team does more than broker dental transitions. We are a team of practice transition consultants, valuation experts, transition specialists, and marketing professionals whose focus is your practice’s success. We tailor each strategy to your individual needs, and that includes foundational leadership training.
Being a leader includes, but is not limited to:
- Active listening
- Delegating and granting autonomy while giving clear guidance and direction
- Accepting guidance and support and being able to take constructive criticism
- Continuously improving your leadership skills and style.
Your dental transition does not have to be a migraine-inducing process. The hardest part of the process is learning to be a leader. But once you have that down, you will attract the right talent for your practice and inspire your team to take ownership in your business and operate a rewarding clinic. You got this.
