683: Eric Hubbard - Does Culture Really Affect Your P&L?

Have you ever wondered whether company culture really affects your P&L? In this episode, Kirk welcomes Eric Hubbard from Pain Free Dental Marketing to talk about the importance of culture and how it can differentiate a dental practice from corporate dentistry. They also discuss the role of core values in shaping culture and the negative impact of tolerating a bad culture fit. Eric shares his personal aha moments and offers advice to dentists on building a healthy culture.

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Main Takeaways

• Culture plays a significant role in the success of a dental practice and its impact on the P&L cannot be underestimated.
• Core values are essential in shaping a positive culture and should be clearly defined and communicated to the team.
• Leadership plays a crucial role in maintaining a healthy culture and should not tolerate a bad culture fit.
• Learning from mistakes and aha moments is essential for personal and professional growth.
• A strong culture can lead to increased team engagement, patient referrals, and acceptance of treatment.

Segments

00:00 Introduction

02:06 The Importance of Culture in Dental Marketing

07:23 The Impact of Culture on the P&L

10:09 The Role of Core Values in Culture

12:39 The Role of Leadership in Shaping Culture

16:28 The Role of Trust in Culture

18:54 The Negative Impact of Tolerating a Bad Culture Fit

20:49 Learning from Mistakes and Aha Moments

25:13 Addressing Dentists' Concerns about Culture

30:02 Culture's Impact on Team Engagement and Growth

34:07 Conclusion

Quotes:

“I think that we're seeing the commoditization of dentistry and with the rise of DSOs and corporate efforts. Corporate dentistry wants the commoditization. They don't want you looking for a specific dentist. They want you looking for a crown. They don't want you to get tied to a hygienist because the turnover is so high.” [5:26 - 5:51]

“There’s a wonderful opportunity in the private practice realm of how to differentiate yourself from that and un-commoditize yourself from insurance, who also wants a commodity in corporate industry.” [5:53 - 6:04]

“You have to differentiate yourself from corporate dentistry. You have to differentiate yourself from what insurance wants you to be. And you have to do that by telling your story. And the basic way to tell your story is being authentic.” [6:25 - 6:38]

“I think to be great, you have to have your core values, talk about them all the time. And I think they, they absolutely have to be, every person in your office is a reflection of that office, and they need to, they need to represent them.” [9:23 - 9:40]

“The first P&L implication I'll say is just around training. We have had one employee quit since 2014. Now we've had other people leave and [others have] asked to leave for cultural reasons, but there's one employee that I'm like, man, that one got away. And to me, employee engagement, employee turnover is the first P&L implication.” [13:19 - 14:05]

“I think the second way is patient referrals. I think patient referrals climb. Any practice that's not getting 55 to 60% of its new patients via referrals, there's no way around it. You have a culture problem.” [15:13 - 15:29]

“I think the third way is patients are going to accept treatment more consistently.” [15:38 - 15:42]

“Nothing kills a great team member than when you tolerate a bad one.” [20:21 - 20:26