Dr James, 1s:

We are continuing the theme in the Dentists Who Invest podcast of podcasts that feature regard feature about people's journeys, especially when it comes to their business journeys, which is ultra cool because there's so much knowledge to put that contained therein. And also it's knowledge that you can only directly learn through experience, which is wonderful for the listeners of the Dentists DentistsWhoInvest podcast, because the only real way that you can learn some of that stuff is to give away years and years and years of your life on trial and error, and we don't want to do that. We want to expedite everybody's journey and create shortcuts where possible. And on that very note, I've got a gentleman sat in front of me today, Fahad Khan, social media star to squat sensation. That was our headline that we came up with today, which we're both rather proud of, which is the title of this podcast, and it's all about Fahad's journey. How are you, my man?

Dr Fahad, 49s:

I'm very well. Thank you and extremely complimentary, but very much appreciated with that title hell yeah, bro.

Dr James, 56s:

well, you know what it's an apt title as well, isn't it? Because you've leveraged social media pretty darn effectively to get your first practice off the ground. And for me, I look back on my journey and I stumbled across social media just by complete accident, virtually because I had this hiatus out of dentistry, which I won't bore everybody with that story, because I've told it a few times in Dentists Who Invest podcast this story with regards to my football injury and my knee, and what that meant was that, for lack of literally just having nothing better to do, I started a Facebook group and I went from zero posts, probably a year or every five years, maybe one post max every five years to like posting every single day. So if there's hope for me to be a convert and a missionary for social media, there's flipping hope for anybody and really there's still so many opportunities out there in 2024. But we're going to get into that in just a moment. But anyway, Fahad, this is, of course, your first time on the Dentists Who Invest podcast, so you know what would be lovely to do If we could have a short and fast bio, a hot take about yourself and your background, and then we can take everything from there.

Dr Fahad, 2m 11s:

Yeah, a hot take about yourself and your background and then we can take everything from there. Yeah, 100% man. So, um, a little bit of the classic failed medic story, which is probably the best thing that ever happened to me, to be honest, with the current landscape of what it's like for junior doctors and things. But ultimately I ended up in dentistry and ended up studying abroad, which again was an amazing opportunity and just because the kind of UK culture I'd experienced it once on my undergrad degree and then I didn't want to go through that whole thing again and feel like the old guy. So I went for a new type of experience, learned a language while I was there and ultimately I think that's where it was really instilled into me that I needed to like work like really really hard, just because I thought, okay, people that are at the UK dental schools, they're going to have like an amazing level of education compared to maybe Europe. And then actually I came back here and just found that there was some strengths. But ultimately there was a lot of areas that me studying abroad and the kind of culture there put me in a really strong position. So then I kind of was working here did equivalent of like a foundation year in the NHS, like a placement year, and then just I've had this desire to kind of progress and get to the next stage, always because I'm I am like inherently ambitious and quite hungry. And so then I basically started putting a little bit of content out there, just recorded on my mobile phone, and it helped quite a lot because I didn't have my like UK counterparts like watching me and I find that when I speak to people now, a lot of what is stopping them from putting content out there is just this judgment of what their friends or peers are going to think, or maybe even their mentors or teachers. So it's kind of disabling them from actually doing that, which is a real shame. So, like as a real, real good bit of advice I was given quite early on was you're putting the content out there to like show patients and then think it's good, you're not trying to get you know dental experts to think you're really good because they're not going to be your patients, they're not going to lead you to generating revenue or happiness or whatever. Um, so yeah, that just kind of started me on my journey. I was doing that. It started really working well for me and then I doubled down on it during COVID and just learned, actually, how does this work on the back end? What are these companies doing? What makes a good kind of strategy and campaign versus a poor one? And then that's what's kind of led me to just growing a following, to be honest, and that's where I get 90% of my patients from.

Dr James, 4m 42s:

Wild and you're following instagram is your main platform of choice, right? I had a little peek on there over the last few weeks and uh, yeah, man, I mean you can clearly see that you've been consistent with your content, which is amazing, and I guess, just to touch upon what you were saying before, there's a whole lot of mental barriers that people have whenever it comes to creating their own content. So you, just you just articulated a big one just then, and it's the fear factor what will people think of me? That's a huge one. For a lot of people I guess for me as well was that I literally just did not get that it would help me or aid me in any way I had no understanding that it was beneficial to me in terms of my career, in terms of my personal development. Maybe there was a little bit of that going on for you as well, yeah definitely, I think for me.

Dr Fahad, 5m 32s:

I've always loved dentistry. I just started from never thinking I'd be able to get in, so that's why I didn't really aim it, because the numbers were low, but ultimately I just really loved it and thought it was cool. But ultimately I just really loved it and thought it was cool. So then I'm into tech as well and I'm always kind of an early adopter when it comes to apps or like social media platforms anyway. And then obviously it doesn't take that much to take the pictures like on your phone, even in the beginning. Now it's a little bit harder because things went completely to video and then they've gone a little bit back to photos. Ultimately, yeah, taking the step and putting yourself out there is is is the biggest thing, but I think it's for me it's inherently clear that it can lead to new patients, even your friends. That's where it really starts. It's like, hey, this is what this guy's about, this is what he's doing. If not, then it's like, if you're not in people's phones now, you're not really in their minds. So you do need to like put yourself out there in some regard if you want to. But saying that one of my closest friends, he's not really into it. He's a very good dentist and he probably will get through his whole career not having to do this stuff as well.

Dr James, 6m 42s:

But it's just if you want to do it accelerated and get your kind of patience through and optimize everything that you can, I would definitely recommend people do it and how did that look for you then, in terms of the journey, so to speak, whenever it came to presumably posting your very first video and then getting a little bit of traction and then posting some more? How did that develop? Was it like overnight we got all these followers, or I just find it comes in little bursts right yeah, yeah, that's right, it comes in little bursts.

Dr Fahad, 7m 14s:

I mean my profile. I used to like do the whole like hyped sneakers thing and I grew it a little bit from that, you know, let's say from a couple of hundred to a thousand or so, and back when I started, having thousands of followers was a big deal. It was kind of cool. Like you know, obviously you get your celebrities they've got a hundred thousand millions but just for like a normal guy like myself, um, that's what got me like to those numbers. And then obviously I transitioned it to dentistry. So then I think when people went on there they were like, oh, there's a couple thousand people following this guy. I should follow him as well. Like, let me take some interest. But it definitely started with like little videos. I even remember doing a COVID hand washy video. They explained how, why you needed to wash for 30 seconds and why that was relevant because for the average person, I realized, like my brothers, if, for example, they would never really understand that that time is taken to need to break down like the wall and all these other things. Um, so I made like a video about that and that did well for me. And then ultimately, to be honest with you, I had like good support and my network around me was like encouraging me, even though the videos I look back at them now and they're kind of some of them are bad.

Dr James, 8m 25s:

Um, I did have really good encouragement from the start and nice comments, let's say awesome man, and when did you first start to realize to yourself that actually this could manifest in interest with regards to your services as a dentist? Or was that very much the plan from the get-go? Was that very much the objective from the get-go?

Dr Fahad, 8m 46s:

it wasn't really. It was more uh, I don't like leaving avenues unexplored. So I was kind of like I'm gonna put stuff out there and I'll see where it goes, and ultimately that that was all it was at the beginning and then I've put more and more out there and literally, like you know, maybe two, three posts later people started inquiring because they they see the proof. You know like they see, images are so powerful. Videos are extremely powerful, but essentially before and afters are showing your ability of what you can do and even to this day it blows my mind because we're in the dental world. We know, you know, how effective something like a composite can be, but people still don't know this stuff. That for x amount of money, let's say 350 or 700 pounds, you can change the entire appearance of your two front teeth, like that is mind-blowing to some people still, where it's just like commonplace to us. And obviously we know you can do it. So I was getting friends and people realized that like, oh, I can, I can do this and he's my friend and I'll support him and I'll have it done. Then it led to more cases, more photos, and then it's just kind of like grown from there to then when it started going out across Sheffield that this guy's doing this stuff here, and it did go a little bit crazy at one time where I was getting like messages every single day for like months and months and months and that was really cool awesome man.

Dr James, 10m 13s:

And what did you learn through that experience as well, because it's undoubted that there would have been some epiphany moments or moments that made you think to yourself actually I thought it was like this and that was a huge misconception, and actually it's more like this, and now that I understand that well, it would have been helpful for me to know this back then, because we're speaking in previous versions of ourselves via this podcast today, of course.

Dr Fahad, 10m 37s:

Yeah, that's great, great question really, and I have reflected on that before. And ultimately the real big take home is that you do not have to be the best. There's actually no benefit to being the best, other than maybe yourself being happy and self-satisfaction, but in terms of business growth and getting patients like you do not have to be the best at all. And that realization was absolutely massive because I know my clinical work's not the best of all time. I think it's good and I think some of it can be really good. But as we all know, man, it's like day to day, a million thing. Little things have to go right for that case. To like pull off is phenomenal and that's fine. But what I kind of realized was, from a average person's eyes, the work only has to be good to great for them to be like blown away by it. And that realization, I think, could really help a lot of people because they're almost waiting for the perfect transformation and the perfect thing, and that that that's one of the realizations I had. And then the second big one was is like you never really know where your next case is going to come from. So you know, you, I've had like people contact me that have saved money and they might be, you know, a little bit hard up for money and they've ended up saving for it because it's really important to them. And then I've had other like people start referring me people. My actual fun, the funniest thing is, is my biggest referral bases are just like normal people. They're not other dental practices, they're like people that have got other businesses and their own clientele and they're the ones that are sending me, uh, patients. So at christmas I buy them gifts instead of like other practices, which is like completely different to what I've seen other people do and that always makes me smile at Christmas there we are.

Dr James, 12m 27s:

Well, you just have to roll with what's right in front of you, don't, don't you? And I guess there's a lesson there, because you really have no idea how it's going to manifest or pan out. You just have to play the cards as you're dealt them, and maybe your biggest referrers aren't even dental practices. But the point is that that doesn't start to happen unless you put yourself out there and you give yourself the opportunity. And, by the way, I should just clarify one thing that I was saying earlier when I said we were speaking a previous version of ourselves in this podcast. What I mean is that some of the listeners out here today have yet to start their social media journey. Some might be ahead of us who knows? Or some might be doing similar stuff to us who the hell knows? People are ahead of other people in respective areas and then also not ahead of other people in other areas. So just to clarify what I meant by that, and that's why it's so useful to have this knowledge, because if you can expedite somebody's journey, that is an amazing thing. Okay, cool. So social media is going well. You're an associate in somebody else, presumably yes, that's correct, yeah you were an associate working for somebody else in your practice and then you thought to yourself okay, cool, hey, this social media stuff's going well. Now it's time for me to step up and start my own practice. Is that the thought process? Is that what went through your head?

Dr Fahad, 13m 40s:

it was a couple of steps before that, because I I'm a little bit risk averse in a sense that I don't think I would have jumped into doing it like straight from straight from there. So I definitely did work for a couple of practices on the way and then learn things as I went on and just viewed like operational things that were happening For example, what kind of receptionists were there and how were they handling these inquiries Because one of the biggest problems I had was I was generating these leads and generating this interest. But ultimately I was. I wasn't in control of the operational sides of the businesses at all. So things were falling apart when, for example, I would tell a lead because you want to be professional as well, so you're not going to ring people and book them in yourself, especially in the days before like dentally and these other things. So I was like giving people practices phone number to like ring up and get booked in and then like they were either at times booking them in with other people, which was like painful, or they were just like kind of screwing up the leads on the phone and then I was like it was a real real you asked earlier about lessons like that was a massive lesson that if your reception in the front of house experience, like, isn't good and optimized, then there's no point generating these leads because they will literally turn them off. And I used to have people messaging me back like, hey, I've rang four times and nobody's picked up. Or hey, I've rang and they told me that you don't have availability, so they booked me in with someone else and I was like literally going nuts.

Dr James, 15m 11s:

Sorry to barge in, but those are examples of holes in the funnel right. Yes, in marketing jargon and for anybody who doesn't know we're referring to, well, it wasn't originally this guy's concept, but Russell Brunson popularized the funnel right, which is the principle that you've got these leads at the very top and they gradually filter down, don't they? And they're sequentially smaller, in smaller proportions, which is represented by the funnel, and then eventually they become paying customers. So the idea is to ensure as many people at the top of the funnel make it to the bottom. But that can't happen if there's leaks and there's people who maybe aren't necessarily. How can we say on the same wavelength whenever it comes to this stuff? And they aren't us, they're other people around us. So that needs to change, right, we need to improve that yeah, that's exactly it.

Dr Fahad, 15m 58s:

And that kind of funnel process when things were going wrong at, let's's say, the top of the funnel. The only way for me to sort that out was to have some control of who was taking those calls. So I tried to do that a little bit at the practice I was at, but ultimately it's not my place to do that as an associate there's only there part-time. Even though they were quite were perceptive as soon as I started increasing the revenue of the practice quite considerably, they were open to listening to what I was saying, but only to a point. So then it was. At that moment I had a realization that was just presented to me, that for me to sort this problem out I need my own practice and I need to choose my own staff member that's going to sit there and and deal with these inquiries really. So that's kind of what birthed the idea of okay, I will have to have my own practice for me to work efficiently, as effectively as possible do you know what?

Dr James, 16m 57s:

I say this with love because dentists are my people, uh, of course. However, sometimes I feel that when it comes to the principles and their own businesses, you presume that loads of them are like business minded and really money orientated, necessarily, and have that business brain. I, I actually think that there's scope to help principles on that front, because they're not always, how can we say, as perceptive or as aware of these things necessarily. But listen, that's a good thing, that's fine, it is what it is right, and actually that's why Denison Invest, I feel, has generated some interest over the years and it's because there is actually scope to help with that information. So I'm saying that, but I'm not necessarily saying that it's not a good thing, I'm just saying it's an opportunity to help.

Dr Fahad, 17m 50s:

But it only starts if we're open-minded in the first place. If we think we know it all, no one's ever going to get through to us. That's right, man. I definitely don't think I know it all. I I've just been trying to be perceptive. I listen to awesome guys that come on your podcast, like ahmed and these other people that are like great insights, and I'm just trying to learn as much as I can. I'm still at a young age, so I'm just trying to learn as much as I can. I'm still at a young age, so I'm just trying to optimize things. And I've had times as well where I'm kind of like wanting to be better but don't necessarily know that it takes time and patience and all these things. But ultimately, if I'm getting better each month that goes by and learning new things, I'm pretty happy because, you know, to become the transition to to business owner is brutal. It has been, for me at least, and I think it's really important to explain like both sides of it. You know, even though I've had the social media thing and it's helped me get my practice earlier than I probably would have been able to before, it's also come with a lot of like hard lessons that I think you need to like be damn ready for if you're, if you're going to go for that avenue, because it's definitely not not easy it's not man.

Dr James, 18m 55s:

And there's part of me although this may be slightly controversial there's part of me who says that actually we don't want it to be easy either, because if it was too easy, everybody could do it and there'd be nothing to learn. It would already be second nature to us. So almost the hardness is actually a byproduct of the fact that there's a lot to learn and get your head around, but it also means that when you break through and you get there, it's clear skies, because only so many people will actually put themselves through that stuff just another way of looking at it, my mindset flip, so to speak. But anyway, you were saying about the practice and you were like right, my funnel is leaky, I got to do something about this. And that's what inspired you to think to yourself right, just what can I do? And should I start my own practice?

Dr Fahad, 19m 35s:

that's exactly it, and there's just little things that I kind of picked up on the way where, ultimately, I've seen examples of people that we probably all have known and heard of, that I have got a little bit of a practice that is only about them. So part of what I was trying to think is OK, I can make it about me in the beginning, but really it's better to focus on a brand rather than just my name. So then all the time I was thinking, ok, let me think of a cool name, a cool brand, a logo, to try and like launch something that's more than just me, because if you're doing it for the purposes of having control and ultimately having your own practice, only, that's fine. But for it to grow and have some sort of potential to become more and more and more over the years, I feel like you need to make it a brand. So then you can bring other dentists on, you can grow their social media presence, you can do something for them more than just provide a space to work in, and that's ultimately what I'm growing to do, and I'm looking for people that are a good man and like-minded, like us. I can see you smiling there because you you know what I mean. We want these kind of people around us that are ambitious and that are looking to grow as well, and that's really what I learned along the way as well is don't just make it about me, make it about a brand and then bring people on to do this with you, because you'll get a lot of satisfaction from doing that too.

Dr James, 21m 3s:

And, with that in mind, what you just just said how did you leverage your social media right, which is effectively your personal brand at this, at that stage, and still is, of course? How did you leverage that to ensure that the practice was a success straight from the get-go, when it was open, when it when it opened? Plus, also have one eye on the fact that you didn't want to make it too brand for hard in the long term? I'm interested to hear yeah.

Dr Fahad, 21m 31s:

So that is a really tough thing, to be fair, and I don't think I've completely got there yet, if I'm honest. So part of it was hey, have a little. I'm sure there's a marketing term for this, but there's like a brand awareness phase to marketing that exists, where you're like letting people know and almost teasing them to the concept of what you're doing and what you've got going on which I did do and then that's like the kind of phase one is like the pre-work that gets done. And then phase two is like attracting them to the prospect of this brand and putting little teasers out there and explaining what your brand identity is and what you're trying to do. And then the third most important thing is creating content that involves other people other than yourself. So a lot of marketing companies don't like that, because they want you to be the face of the brand, because it's easier to get people to that, because they always quote numbers of followers, for example, that tesla have got versus elon musk, like elon's got a lot more. Like the personal people behind them always have more followers, because people resonate and connect with people more, um, rather than brands, especially when it comes to, like health care things, um, but what I was trying to do from the beginning was involve my team members in the content. So I've got them to be involved in videos so people familiarize themselves with the receptionist, the dental nurse, and then they feel like they know us when they're coming in and I don't really know where the idea came from. It just was important to me and people have noticed that, and I think it empowers your staff as well. But there'll be people listening to this that are like, oh well, I wish I had someone like that that worked for me. They won't even be in like the background of a clip, but that's the one benefit of doing a squat is that you can build your team around these philosophies and concepts. I wish I bought a practice that I could just inherit our operational structure and a staff for, but it wasn't available to me, and so I'm kind of glad I did it this way, because I could structure things like this and I think it's going to pay off as time goes on.

Dr James, 23m 31s:

Fingers crossed yeah, man, you definitely want to have one eye on not making it completely reliant on your personal brand, so it's good to hear that that's a workaround. Effectively are those things that you're able to put in place. So, when it came to the practice itself and when it came to you opening the doors, how did you synergize that, how did you choreograph that between your social media and the day that the practice opened its doors? Like, for example, did you put loads of posts out there or did you say join a waiting list or something along those lines? Because this is the part. I feel like people don't get this part Right, because it's like OK, we've got the social media and it's working really well for me as an associate, I'm going to open the squat practice, but what are the logistics of just tying those two things together? I'm actually intrigued to hear this.

Dr Fahad, 24m 20s:

Yeah. So a super important point as well. And you know, in the in-between period, obviously you're getting inquiries through and ultimately people don't want to wait, but you're telling them like, look, if you can wait until this date, I can see you at my own place, or if you want to travel, I'm working here and I'm still working as an associate in a couple of places. But ultimately you do lose some people in that time. But logistically, it's like you've put the brand awareness stuff out there. People are taking an interest. I had like a waiting page on my website what could capture their information, which was key, and then it was like we had like a certain amount of people to go at right for the opening. So that was really critical because, again, as I said, I'm quite risk averse and it felt incredibly heartwarming that like people would wait and come to your practice when it was just new. So it's quite a strange thing because I really empathize with people that have just literally opened a squat where they've just opened the doors and they're just waiting for people to grow. I don't think I've got the heart for that. Um, so with mine it was cool because we'd done this run-up and we had a good strategy for it, and then it enabled us to be full for like the first three, four weeks, which is just, yeah, it's insane. It's insane, and I'm thankful to everyone that supports me to to have enabled that really.

Dr James, 25m 47s:

I imagine you know there's three, four weeks and obviously you know what you're doing when it comes to clinical dentistry, but you know whenever you've just opened, then you practice and nobody knows where anything is and it's all rather uncomplicated. I imagine that was a fun three, four weeks, but you'd rather have that right than the books being empty yeah, man, it's.

Dr Fahad, 26m 7s:

It's a tough one because it's like you're going to go through that period regardless. Like again, there'll be people listening to this that you know, incredibly more organized than me. They will have potentially had other practices, but you know, when you need that thing and you don't have it, it always happens and that can happen at reception, it can happen at the desk. We had tech issues. There was definitely certain things with, like, the booking links that some of them didn't work and all kinds of crazy stuff happens. But I feel like it doesn't matter how much you prepare. You've got to go through that period where you're having to firefight problems that come up and ultimately it's hard because the CQC approval process is is brutal as well and you don't really have a definite timeline for when you can open. And that is a really difficult thing because you've got all this interest and you've got this stuff but really if you don't pass your CQC, you're opening and it can be months that go by before you get another shot at doing that, and I know someone that has happened to as well. So it's a little bit of risk that's involved in doing that and I'm not going to lie Like I don't want people out there think oh, this was an easy process, like I worked really extremely hard, like with everything I've got to do this and launch it and for this to happen, really yeah, it's the same with any regulatory body, isn't it?

Dr James, 27m 32s:

They're not really business minded, they just have to ensure the due process is carried out, and it takes as long as it takes, which doesn't do anything for our pocket, really, when you have to think about the numbers and what have you. But listen, I guess it's a good thing that they're so diligent whenever it comes to this stuff, so not just anybody can set up effectively. Okay, brilliant. So that was how you married those two together, which is super interesting, and I feel like that's a very niche piece of useful knowledge right there, because I feel like there'll be some people potentially listen to this podcast today who are like, okay, but how do I stitch those two things together? So that will have served as a little bit of a framework, which is really cool. And you opened your squat in january of 2024, right, that's right.

Dr Fahad, 28m 14s:

Yeah, so we were going through the approval processes and there's a lot to learn actually. Like there's all sorts of regulation stuff, health care acts, all the rest of this stuff that I won't trivialize it because, like you said it's, it's there to protect, um, like, the people of our country really and and make sure things are safe. But when you're having to do all that on top of everything, it can be, it can be tough, and so that stuff's all in place. But I opened it in with the aim of, like January and we just about got there where it was open for the last week of Jan and then from then on it's been. It's been open and doing pretty good.

Dr James, 28m 52s:

Wonderful, and how have things evolved since then?

Dr Fahad, 28m 56s:

yeah, so it's evolved pretty well. I mean, I I can't lie like I've definitely found it tough at times riding the calendar landscape of you know being quiet in summer and all this kind of stuff. But when you've got like full control of the the business is, you can make changes and ultimately the controls. The real thing. That got me really frustrated before, because when you work for, like corporates, their websites a certain way and you can't really implement changes to their quickly at all, so then if you're wanting to do advertising or marketing, they they limit you like so badly. So that's why I'd say to people if they're listening and you want to do it, just take it into your own hands. Like you've got so many opportunities now with TikTok, instagram, all these other social media things that are coming out there. Just get going, because that will stay with you, even if you're at a practice that provides you like good patience. Don't just accept that, because that could go away at any moment. Like that's just the world we live in now. So try to like put things in your control and as best as you can and I've managed to do that with having a really good marketing company that we're working with now and we're putting out good content. That's quite like focused on specific treatments, and we'll see how it goes for the rest of the year.

Dr James, 30m 19s:

Hell yeah man. So just as busy patients still queuing up. How have you managed to take some of the leads that have come through to your DMs and distribute them amongst your associates? How does that conversation look, because I feel like that's a little bit of a bottleneck right there. There's only one for hard right 100.

Dr Fahad, 30m 37s:

So at the moment I've got like a really uh good hygiene therapist that works uh, kendra, she's called and she can do like composite bonding, whitening, things like that. And ultimately there's some people that you know just contact the practice through the marketing and they just want to be booked in with who's best and ultimately, again, the key is on the phone. If the person picking up on the phone is positive about the person they're working with and they like them essentially, then they're quite easy to book in with them because they can justify hey, see Kendra for whitening, she can also do your stain removal and she's the best person to see you. And but what? I've got a strategy for that when I get a true associate, and a lot of that revolves around putting them in video content and creating like a storyline or like content specifically around them. So people want to book in with them rather than me. It'd make me incredibly happy if somebody rang up and and book in with them rather than me. It'd make me incredibly happy if somebody rang up and and booked in with them instead of me, in a way, um, because then it would mean that I was successful and what I've set out to achieve good man.

Dr James, 31m 44s:

Okay, so there's, there's a game plan in there and I can see that working, because it's ultimately just familiarity, right that's right, that's right, that's what we're averaging there's a lot of trust.

Dr Fahad, 31m 54s:

That's there. Like I do know other practices as well, that there's a couple of people that do the consults and then they hate the word. Well, I don't hate the word, but essentially they sell you on who they think should see for different parts of the treatment. And in america this is actually much more normalized than it is here, so they have separate people for the separate treatments and different things. They're the same team but it's much more normalized there. So that strategy as well helps, because people will come to see me and if I say, hey, go and see this guy for bonding, like he's better than me and he'll get you a really good result ultimately, because they trust me as that figure, they will go to see them and have it done. And if they really really want me to do it, then then I can, but I might not be the best man for the job anymore cool, so it can be done.

Dr James, 32m 45s:

It can be done. Yeah, this that's. That's one of the main things that I feel is a takeaway for people on the podcast here today, because I feel like that might be a roadblock where people are like, oh what have I become a victim of my own success and all this stuff. But in other words, there's workarounds, effectively. So I'm just curious to know what's next in the pipeline. What does the future hold for dr, for had having got to where you've got half, which is flipping amazing. What does the next level look like?

Dr Fahad, 33m 13s:

so the next level for me is like attracting people to come and work at the practice that have got a similar mindset to me. As I was saying earlier, like I don't, of course I want people that are good at clinical dentistry, but it's more important to me that they're personable, they've got a really good skill set and that they're willing to grow and understand these different measures, because just having someone that's really really good at clinical dentistry but if they don't want to be involved with the team or on on the content, then there's less I can do for them than somebody else. So my goal right now is to grow the practice, have people working there every day of the week but that are enjoying themselves and that I can provide value to, and finding those people is the challenge really. I've got a couple of people in the pipeline that I'm thinking of, but a lot of people nowadays they don't want the risk and they're scared of being sued, and I find that's probably the biggest difference between people. Like the difference in them isn't NHS versus private, is it's the. Do they have the ambition and are they willing to take on that next level of risk or are they not? And that's the biggest disparity I'm seeing with dentists in the UK well it it's.

Dr James, 34m 34s:

The regulators have a lot to answer for on that front, I fear, because ultimately it's inhibiting the quality of dentistry that we could be providing for patients. So the patients are missing out. So I can't say I blame the dentist. Well, you know, there's accountability. There's a lot of different layers of accountability going on there which we won't get into in this podcast today. But I think it's fair to say that we, uh, we're familiar with the culture. Let's just say that and we can understand where that mindset comes from, at least in part, whether or not we agree with it. Who the hell knows? But anyway, we're not going to get into that today. Who knows, there might be a dentist listening to this podcast today, fab, who might reach out to you?

Dr Fahad, 35m 14s:

yeah, I would love them too. And even if, even if you just reach out on a friendly basis to say, hey, man, I experienced that same thing. I'm enjoying connecting, like, with the dental community so much and that's why I love your podcast, to be honest, because I just find that, like the people that are on there, they're thinking similar things to what I do and they're going through similar things to what I have or will do. So it just brings it, because dentistry can be an extremely lonely place. You just think, oh, I'm going through these issues and all this and it's comforting to read, you know and hear other things that people are doing and experiencing for sure, and this podcast is testament to that man you know what?

Dr James, 35m 55s:

well, listen, thank you for that, and actually that's a big part of the message as well. Right there, people say that people who start podcasts, start communities, start followings, everything along those lines in part, they're sharing lessons that they've learned and they wish they would have realized sooner. And actually one of the things that I wish I would have realized sooner is that there are actually a lot of people out there who, number one, want to help you and, number two, know a lot of shit about what you're going through or what you'd like to achieve in your life whatever the hell that is, whether it's opening a dental practice, whether it's hitting the next level as an associate, whatever like. Why would you spend all this? This is me talking to my previous version of myself, James why would you spend all this time trying to figure this stuff out, when you can ask somebody and they'll probably be able to speed that journey up or speed up those realizations by quite a number of months or years, and then what it means is when you learn what to do or you understand what to do. Maybe it's not like fully the answer, because obviously everybody's unique and everybody's situation is slightly different, but even if they can speed it up by like 80. That is an amazing thing and it doesn't start unless you talk to people and most level most people have low level anxiety of reaching out to new people and they really do, which is actually a huge subconscious barrier that they hold in their head which is holding them back from leveraging that amazing thing that I've just talked about. So you know, when you feel that fear from talking to new people, see it for what it is stupid subconscious barrier that's probably there from our caveman days, where it was, we were less likely to survive if we went out and fraternized with other tribes, where now it doesn't apply in 2024 and it's actually a big thing that could be holding us back from learning those lessons and enhancing our ability to succeed in life.

Dr Fahad, 37m 39s:

I wish a younger version of James would not only have heard that, but also embraced it as well yeah, man, I'd 100% agree with that and, like I said, I spend a lot of time thinking about mindset as well, and what you're saying like rings completely true and I hope that, like a lot of people listening to this realize, if they haven't already, that reaching out to other people in the dental communities the best thing that you can do, because they understand a million things straight away so you can skip those stages of explaining like how stressful your day is or how you're a problem solver and you've got to do all these things and micromanage all these little problems, even as an associate, like we get it. So then you can start off on a different footing and it's extremely helpful to like share experiences and and definitely the mindset with people. Now I feel like I can understand it more and I could even understand if a load of generation of new dentists coming through did not even want to even bark up the practice tree just because of the stress and worry about it all. I could completely get that and that's like another interesting thought that I've had that if somebody gave me like 200k now, whatever it takes to open a practice like, is that necessarily the best thing to do that anymore? I think that question is going to be tested a lot over the next five years particularly, and we'll see if it's still a good idea or not that's the thing.

Dr James, 39m 2s:

We only ever really know. The answers these things in the fullness of time or whenever a specific time frame has fully developed. And this is the thing you're so right. It's like how do we know a decision is good or bad unless we are referencing a particular period of time that has elapsed since we made that decision and actually it might look like a bad decision for the first year but then an amazing decision for the rest of our life, or vice versa. Who the hell knows, man? But you know, uh, but I generally think most of the time when I, when I come across people who started practice, they, they, they, they feel positive about it. The vast majority of the time, they, they, think it was a great decision and they're really happy with it. So food for thought, people in the audience. And just one more thing on the reaching out and speaking to people thing that we just mentioned a second ago. I know you referenced the podcast that I did relatively recently, about a month ago, with Amadji Aziri. He told me that four people reached out to him off the back of that podcast, which is really cool. So food for thought for the audience, and actually Dr Fahad is very much of the same mindset as Mr J Aziri and the other wonderful dentists that we've had on this podcast. So, yeah, networking is extremely important and it's actually a win-win for everybody, which is really cool. Anyway, Fahad, you've been really generous with your time and with your knowledge on the Dentists Who Invest podcast today. I want to thank you so much, on behalf of the listeners as well, for coming on. Let's do another episode in a few months time to see how you're getting along and we can have a little bit of a catch up.

Dr Fahad, 40m 32s:

Yeah, 100% man would love that. And yeah, yeah, thank you to everyone as well, um, and if you do want to reach out, I'm very easy to find, can google me, instagram, linkedin, whatever. If you have any questions, or just to say, hey, man, I thought that was cool, do it because I love connecting with other people cool bro.

Dr James, 40m 49s:

Much love Fahad, looking forward to our next episode. Hope you have a smash on monday and we'll see each other soon thank you, man appreciate you.