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Have you heard claims like "less than 1% of dental practices fail"? Today we're exploring how that may not be the case! In this episode, I'm sitting down with Ali Oromchian to debunk common myths about the failure rates of practices and uncover the essential strategies that can help you mitigate risks in this challenging field. From the critical importance of due diligence when acquiring a practice to the necessity of robust HR practices, we delve into the nitty-gritty details that can make or break your career. Ali's insights are not just theoretical; they are drawn from real-world experiences and seasoned legal advice.
As we navigate through this discussion, Ali emphasizes the transformative power of creating a positive work environment to attract and retain top talent. You'll learn the subtleties of maintaining compliance with ever-evolving legal requirements and avoiding common HR missteps that many practice owners fall victim to. Whether you're just starting or looking to optimize your existing practice, this episode is packed with actionable advice that can help elevate your practice to the next level. Stay tuned until the end to find out how you can get in touch with Ali for personalized guidance and support.
Let's learn how to minimize risk and maximize peace of mind in our practices today with, Ali Oromchian!
You can reach out to Ali Oromchian here:
HR for Health Website: https://www.hrforhealth.com/ (Don't forget to mention the podcast sent you!)
Ali's Website: https://www.dmcounsel.com/
Phone: 925-999-8200
Mentions and Links:
Software/Tools:
If you want your questions answered on Monday Morning Episodes, ask me on these platforms:
My Newsletter: https://thedentalmarketer.lpages.co/newsletter/
The Dental Marketer Society Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/2031814726927041
Michael: Hey Ali, so talk to us. What's one piece of advice you can give us this Monday morning.
Ali: All right, Michael, thanks for inviting me on
here. You know, I'll tell you, you know, business owners, whenever you talk to these lenders, they always
throw this statistic out at you. They say.
You know, less than 1 percent of all dental practices, you know, fail. and they, they always throw that out there because they're excited to want you to kind of be energetic And, empower to start your own practice, um, or to buy a practice. but the reality is, is that it's really not 1 percent or less than 1%. you know, there may be very few practices that don't do well, But a lot of
people suffer, right? A lot of
people suffer.
you know, the way to avoid suffering, the way to make the practice ownership kind of process, um, exciting and
fulfilling is to limit and minimize
your exposure to risk.
Right? and so, with that, you know, if you're buying a practice,
making sure you're doing all of your due diligence, right? you know, making sure you're looking at. you know, the patient, you know, charts, you know, looking at all the financials,
looking at everything that you need to look at from a legal perspective to make sure that you're actually buying what you're buying.
if you're doing a startup, you know, making sure that you have a lawyer or someone looking at your leases and making sure that's done well. Um,
and then finally,
I would say, you know, making sure in either
scenario that you have your HR house in order, that you are hiring your employees
correctly, you're giving them lunches and breaks when you're supposed to you're giving them overtime when you're supposed to doing all those things that you're supposed to
do, you're actually
doing from a legal perspective.
And, And I think if you do those things, your risks will be
minimized, and then you can not suffer. Right. And so, you know, it's a little bit unpopular, but people, people are like, Oh my gosh, less than 1 percent of dentists fail. So let's all go do it. And it's like, yeah, everybody should be in, you know, a practice owner.
Absolutely. But I want to prevent you from suffering. Right. And the suffering is when You know, you don't do the right marketing, you don't have the legal, components done well, and then, and then over time you struggle and you grow not as fast as you should, you get sued, you know, you get all those things happen and, that can really impact your happiness and your drive to continue growing the practice and, uh, and, and that's one of the things, Michael, that's been my mission throughout my career has been to help young doctors get empowered to become practice owners.
But doing it in a way where their risks are minimized so that they don't have those exposures long term.
Michael: Got you. Okay. I like that. So one thing you mentioned is, which we appreciate that, right, the preventing the suffering, right? Because it is true. You can say you're not going to fail, but is it worth the, you know what I mean?
All that, man, we've been suffering for like 20 years, 15, 10, five, right? But you mentioned have your house in order. And I know something right now, and maybe you've been seeing this, Ali, where it's like It's hard to maintain or retain those great employees sometimes and then sometimes it's even just hard to find
Ali: yeah
Michael: team members So what are your thoughts like on that when it comes to suffering in that sense?
Ali: Yeah. Oh my gosh I'm, so glad you asked about this because this is like one of those areas that we get so many questions about here's the thing i'll tell you the number one recruiting tool hands down year over year over year Is not indeed. It's not monster. com.
It's not Craig's list. It's none of those things. The number one recruiting tool for finding really good employees is your current team, Because guess what? They're going around saying to people. Yeah, because they have friends who are RDAs, DAs, hygienists, you know, whatnot and they're going to them and saying, you know what, I love where I work, you know, you know, my doctor does this and my doctor does that and, and we have so much flexibility in this regard where I get these benefits and then their friends want to join the practice, right?
So I always say, It's really important from a recruitment perspective that you create an atmosphere that people want to come and the best way for people to come is by the current team recruiting them in, you know, inviting their friends. And so I always say, talk to your team and say, Hey, if you know anybody that's good, that's looking to change, please invite them in for an interview and whatnot.
And you'll be surprised how many people do that if it's a good environment. If it's not a good environment, then they won't. Right. They don't want to do that. They won't invite people to come in and interview and whatnot. So, so I would say from a recruitment perspective, I would focus on that. from a legal perspective, I think, uh, you know, making sure you've got all the basic documents that you need when you're hiring everybody.
Uh, you know, making sure you have an employment manual and things of that nature. I think those basics that companies like HR for health provide, I think are, great. You know, and if you do that. then that suffering goes down because the chance of a lawsuit also goes down dramatically.
Michael: Well, that's interesting.
Where do people normally, in your experience, drop the ball when it comes to the basics?
Ali: I think they rely on companies that they shouldn't rely on for their HR. Like, for example, a lot of people will Rely on their payroll company to provide them HR documents. Well, the payroll company is a payroll company, they're going to provide you the basic documents they need for running payroll They're not an HR company, right? So so I think I think that's the first Um, the second is not having an employment manual that's up to date, and I think you know, especially with all the rule changes since covid it's super important to You To have an updated employment manual.
Um, and then the third is what's called wage and hour and wage. An hour is something that's a problem nationwide because it's about paying people correctly for overtime, giving lunches at the right time of the day. Giving breaks when you're supposed to, making sure the paychecks are correct, you know, all the, things around the financial side of, payroll, um, that people make mistakes on.
So, I think if you do those three things, and you do them well, you're well on your way.
Michael:
Ali: for health from a HR perspective. We'll make sure your hands down compliant from A to Z a hundred percent.
Michael: Okay. Wow. That's amazing, man. I know you guys have a software too.
Is that true?
Ali: so HR4L is a SaaS based software, so it's all online, you know, the employees, you know, clock in and clock out, they sign things electronically, so everything's very sort of streamlined.
Michael: Do you guys ever, if I needed like a person, you know what I mean? Like, can I need a consultant to talk about this type of like compliancy or something's happening a unique situation, right?
Do you guys have that too?
Ali: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, we have a unlimited hr support actually, where they can be on the phone Uh with some one of our you know, hr experts at any time of the day Uh, really all day long, um and as many times as they need if for some reason they can't answer it then it goes one level higher to lawyers And depending on where they are in the country, they'll either be talking to, you know, our firm and someone like me or a friendly firm that does a lot of HR.
but either way, you know, we take care.
Michael: Yeah. Cause I know that's super important, Ali. I feel like sometimes maybe you might've seen this. We ask questions like on a forum, right? Like dental town or Facebook groups and things like that. Yeah. And people give their advice and opinions, but it's a different state.
Right. Different rules, different things. And so like maternity leave, right. Or when it comes to, I don't know, like, depending on should we pay them for, lunch and learn, right. Kind of things like that. And so do you see that a lot?
Ali: I do. Yeah. People, I like to think that people are good intention, Michael.
And so when they go on these, uh, blogs and whatnot, whether it's Facebook groups or it's, uh, you know, like using like dental town or other things that they contribute. Because they want to be helpful, right? And they're using their own base of knowledge, but you hit it on the head. I mean, I can't tell you how many times somebody has given advice to someone else without even knowing what state they're in,
you know, and if you don't know what state they're in, then you, how can you advise on any of these rules? But what people are doing is they're giving their own personal advice based on their experience, which may not be right. And what's scary is we see it sometimes where somebody takes that advice, And does something with it and then they get in trouble because it was the wrong advice, you know, and this, this happened actually recently where, you know, a young doctor coming out of school on the practice for a few years and, uh, hadn't been paying their, uh, assistance minimum wage.
They weren't paying the minimum wage in the state that they were in. Why? Because they had gone on one of these groups and asked the question and the person replied with the minimum wage in their state, not in this person's state. and what's even worse, and you'll, you'll laugh at this. The payroll company that was running their payroll didn't even tell them, right? Wouldn't you think, Michael, that if you're using a payroll service and you're paying someone below state law in terms of minimum wage, they would tell you what that is? I mean, it's just like crazy. And they didn't, they didn't. And of course, You know, the employees got upset, and, uh, when they found out and it's funny because they went like almost a year, almost a whole year, like nine months without saying a word.
And then that January, the law changed and, the minimum wage increased. And then the employees saw it in the news and they were like, Wait a second, like I'm being paid 14. 25. It says minimum wage went up to 16 from 15 like something like what the hell just happened, you know? Yeah, yeah.
And so, so like it was a disaster, but that's what I mean by, you know, payroll companies are not HR companies. And there's so many ways of, doing this wrong. And, and remember what we were talking about in the beginning about suffering, like how bad does that doctor feel? Yeah. Right. Right. It's not like, I mean, you know, you work with doctors all the time.
They're not trying to steal from employees. They're not trying to not pay them the minimum of what they, but they just make mistakes and like, it's just, you know, that's the suffering that I want to avoid.
Michael: Yeah, that you want doctors to avoid. Awesome. Holly. I appreciate your time. If anyone has further questions or concerns, where can they find you?
Ali: you can just go to our website if you'd like. It's, uh, d m council. com C O U N S E L. Uh, or you can call the office at 9 Um, and of course, if you just Google my name, you know, I'm everywhere. And so you guys can find me there so
Michael: awesome. So that's going to be in the show notes below. If you guys want to.
Go in the show notes below and check out and ask and pick Ollie's brain a little bit more. Right? Ask him any questions or concerns about this. So awesome, Ollie. Thank you so much for being with me on this Monday morning episode.
Ali: Thanks, Michael. I appreciate it.