In this episode, Dr. Kevin Cassidy shares his journey from mowing the lawn at his father's orthodontic practice to joining the team, eventually buying the business, and scaling it over the next two decades. He discusses the decision to partner with Southern Orthodontic Partners, the mindset shift that came with stepping back from daily operations, and the challenges of leading his team through change. Dr. Cassidy also reflects on his experience in Shore University's Leadership Academy, where he reconnected with his passion for mentorship and rediscovered joy in his work. He highlights the power of trust, transparency, and leading with heart.

Key Takeaways:

• How Dr. Kevin Cassidy scaled a second-generation orthodontic practice into a high-growth business
• Why partnering with Southern Orthodontic Partners helped him rediscover purpose and joy in his work
• Lessons from Shore University’s Leadership Academy on servant leadership and team culture
• What Dr. Cassidy wishes he knew about change management before selling his practice
• The mindset shift from doing everything to leading with trust and letting go of control

Chapters:

• 00:00 Introduction
• 04:41 The Decision to Partner with SOP
• 11:50 Leadership and Personal Growth
• 16:06 Navigating Change and Communication
• 23:02 Looking Ahead: Future Plans

Listen to our podcasts at:

https://www.shorecp.university/podcasts

You'll also find other Microcap Moments episodes, alongside our series Everyday Heroes and Bigger. Stronger. Faster., highlighting the people and stories that make the microcap space unique.

Other ways to connect:

Blog: https://www.shorecp.university/blog

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This podcast is the property of Shore Capital Partners LLC. None of the content herein is investment advice, an offer of investment advisory services, or a recommendation or offer relating to any security. See the “Terms of Use” page on the Shore Capital website for other important information.

Michael Burcham: 00:00:18

Welcome to Microcap Moments, a podcast from Shore Capital Partners that highlights the stories of founders, investors, and leaders who have taken on the challenge of transforming ideas and small companies into high growth organizations.

Michael Burcham: 00:00:32

The journey of building and scaling a business takes one down many unexpected paths.

Michael Burcham: 00:00:37

It's a journey where we learn from our mistakes fall down often, but have the entrepreneurial grit to pick ourselves up and persevere.

Michael Burcham: 00:00:45

Within this series, we will share these stories of success and failure of the challenges and the rewards faced by those who dare to dream big.

Michael Burcham: 00:00:54

And through their lessons learned, we hope to inspire others who are on a similar journey of becoming, growing and leading.

Anderson Williams: 00:01:02

In this episode, I talk with Dr. Kevin Cassidy of Cassidy Orthodontics, a partner in Southern Orthodontic Partners.

Anderson Williams: 00:01:08

Dr. Cassidy talks about his decision not only to follow in his father's footstep in orthodontics, but to buy his father's practice.

Anderson Williams: 00:01:15

He shares how he grew the practice over 20 years, and his decision to start looking for an exit strategy, a family practice, a small community, generations of patients, and a critical call to an orthodontic school colleague.

Anderson Williams: 00:01:27

Dr. Cassidy's story is one that shows the value of building relationships and treating people right, every step, every day, along the way.

Anderson Williams: 00:01:35

And this is why he and I connected so immediately and so strongly from the first time we met.

Anderson Williams: 00:01:40

Dr. Cassidy shares how his participation in Shore University's Leadership Academy, which I have the privilege of facilitating, has transformed his most recent era of his practice in leadership and how his partnership with SOP has transformed his career and his life.

Anderson Williams: 00:01:55

Welcome, Dr. Cassidy.

Anderson Williams: 00:01:57

I'm looking forward to today's conversation.

Anderson Williams: 00:01:59

To get started, will you just introduce yourself and say who you are, what you do, where you do it, that kind of thing.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:04

Dr. Cassidy: Thanks, Anderson.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:05

It's great to be back with you again.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:07

Dr. Kevin Cassidy.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:08

I'm an orthodontist in Topeka, Kansas.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:11

I've been married to my wife Marcy, who's a school superintendent.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:14

It'll be 35 years this July.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:16

I have two grown children.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:18

one 27 and one 24.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:20

Our oldest child's getting married in about two months, and our youngest son is finishing law school in May.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:25

So lots of big stuff going on.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:27

I've been in practice since 1996 and I'm a second generation orthodontist.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:32

Joined my dad's practice in 96 and bought it in 2000 and have run it ever since.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:38

Yeah, so say more about that.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:39

Did you grow up like in the office or what was that like as you decided?

Anderson Williams: 00:02:44

I could see it going two ways.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:45

Like no way I'm ever gonna do what my dad does, or, yes, I absolutely wanna do what my dad does.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:50

How did that come to be for you?

Anderson Williams: 00:02:51

Dr. Cassidy: Yeah, so I started mowing the lawn.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:53

That was my first adv.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:54

At the practice.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:55

Dr. Cassidy: Exactly.

Anderson Williams: 00:02:56

You know?

Anderson Williams: 00:02:56

But then I graduated into the lab and I would grind study models and make retainers and do things like that, and not seriously being in the lab with patient care.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:04

I was never allowed to be on the floor with patient care, but just seeing the transitions of people who come in with crooked teeth, the straight teeth and the relationships that you begin to build with them as they start as maybe a 13 or 14-year-old.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:17

You kind of follow them as they grow up, and I just like, that's really kind of a cool thing to be able to make people smiles better, make their confidence better.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:26

I just thought that was a really, really cool thing and since that's what he did, that's kind of all I knew about dentistry.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:32

And say more about that.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:33

I think that my time with you and with other orthodontists within Southern Orthodontic has kind of opened my eyes.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:39

You know, I was a kid, I had to have braces, I had crooked teeth, I had jaw alignment, all those kinds of things.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:44

Everybody I know did.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:45

My kids do.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:46

Say more about that transformation you were just speaking to about helping someone smile.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:52

Dr. Cassidy: Yeah, so a lot of times you'll see children come in and the parents will say, he never smiles.

Anderson Williams: 00:03:59

He won't show it, and you can see it the first time you meet 'em.

Anderson Williams: 00:04:01

They're embarrassed of their smile.

Anderson Williams: 00:04:03

They're very self-conscious of it.

Anderson Williams: 00:04:04

And really one of my goals is beyond getting them a smile, I want to establish rapport with them, of course, and I want them to begin to come out of their shell while we're making their smile better.

Anderson Williams: 00:04:15

One of the mantras in my office is I want their visit.

Anderson Williams: 00:04:18

With me to be the best part of their day.

Anderson Williams: 00:04:20

Now, it may not be because what we're doing that day, but I want our environment, I want our interactions to all be very positive, to let them know that, hey, we're going on a pathway right now.

Anderson Williams: 00:04:30

We're taking a journey right now.

Anderson Williams: 00:04:31

And at the end of the journey, it's gonna be a transformative process.

Anderson Williams: 00:04:34

And you're gonna be a different looking person.

Anderson Williams: 00:04:37

And my hope is that you have the self-confidence to show that beautiful smile.

Anderson Williams: 00:04:41

So, Dr. Cassidy, you mentioned that you bought your practice from your dad in 2000, and then at some point as you built your practice, you also considered joining a new company, selling that practice, partnering with Southern Orthodontic or others.

Anderson Williams: 00:04:56

Can you talk a little bit about two sides of that.

Anderson Williams: 00:04:59

One is how did you think about that family legacy continuing this connection between your family and the families you serve, but then what you were looking for in a partnership and why that seemed the right thing.

Anderson Williams: 00:05:10

So the first side is how did you think about your own family legacy as you considered that move?

Anderson Williams: 00:05:16

Dr. Cassidy: Yeah, and we'll start with that because those two events are very, very far apart.

Anderson Williams: 00:05:20

In the life of my practice.

Anderson Williams: 00:05:22

So, you know, in 2000 when I bought the practice, my goal was just to build it.

Anderson Williams: 00:05:25

You know, back in the day it was, you know, the old model was put your shingle up.

Anderson Williams: 00:05:29

They'll come to you, go on your merry way.

Anderson Williams: 00:05:32

But I realized I wanted to do something bigger and better.

Anderson Williams: 00:05:34

Now, the why I didn't really know.

Anderson Williams: 00:05:36

It was just ingrained in me, okay, let's build, build, build.

Anderson Williams: 00:05:38

And so the biggest transformative part for me was building a new building and moving into it in 2010.

Anderson Williams: 00:05:44

That allowed me to really expand my operations, become more efficient, do things like that, that really set me on a growth chart that was incredible.

Anderson Williams: 00:05:52

So fast forward to, I think it was either 21 or 22.

Anderson Williams: 00:05:57

One of my mentors, Dustin Burleson, he's an orthodontist from Kansas City, who I follow a lot.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:02

I took his Napoleon Hills Laws of Success class.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:05

Amazing, fantastic.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:07

And then we had a reunion in Orlando, I think in spring of 22.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:10

I can't remember the date.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:11

But at that meeting, were two representatives from an OSO and A DSO.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:17

And they started talking about, if you want to partner, here's this thing.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:20

And they said, if you're looking at potentially retiring the next five to seven years, this is your best opportunity.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:26

And I turned and looked at Marcy.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:27

I'm like, that's me.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:28

And so that's what started the ball rolling.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:31

Before then, I had not any idea of what I was gonna do at all.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:35

That triggered me.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:36

I was like, Hey, maybe there is something higher out there for me.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:39

So I started, uh, looking around.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:41

At several organizations actually had an NDA from another group that I was considering.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:47

And then that fell through.

Anderson Williams: 00:06:48

And then I got a cold email from somebody at SOP and my marketing manager said, who is this group?

Anderson Williams: 00:06:54

And do you wanna do this?

Anderson Williams: 00:06:55

And so I looked at it and I looked it up and I realized that the founder was Scott Blackman, who was in residency a year behind me.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:02

So I've known Scott for 30 years plus.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:05

So I picked up the phone and I called Scott and we had an hour long conversation and that's how we got the ball rolling.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:11

Wow.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:12

Dr. Cassidy: So I don't know if it was fate.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:13

I don't know if, if somebody's looking over me.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:15

That's amazing.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:16

Just talk a little bit about that business owner, entrepreneur side of you.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:20

That was between you taking your father's practice and this conversation with SOP.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:24

Dr. Cassidy: At the beginning when I took over, I realized that there were a lot of inefficiencies in the office, which we all have and we still do to this day.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:32

But I saw room for growth in the marketing aspect, especially.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:36

My dad used to joke that marketing was a four letter word to him.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:39

Well, back in the two thousands it wasn't.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:41

You know, especially roll back to 2007, 2008 with the big drop.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:46

You look at the dot-com implosion in 2000, 2001, I realized things had to be done differently.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:52

And so we really hit a big marketing campaign just getting out and about because a fairly small community.

Anderson Williams: 00:07:57

And so it was a lot of personal interactions and so that was kind of that low hanging fruit you could grab and go off of that.

Anderson Williams: 00:08:04

But I reached a point where late 2000's that I realized the current building I was in was out of date and did not offer me what I needed moving forward to expand where I truly wanted to be.

Anderson Williams: 00:08:15

So we moved in in 2010 to the new building.

Anderson Williams: 00:08:18

And then one of the biggest things I did was I really went full scale into aligner therapy.

Anderson Williams: 00:08:25

I don't wanna get too deep into that, but that really changed a lot of my growth in terms of being able to see more patients with the same amount of team members.

Anderson Williams: 00:08:34

And becoming a lot more efficient.

Anderson Williams: 00:08:35

So that's really, and then the marketing, the experience as I got older, you become one of the.

Anderson Williams: 00:08:41

"senior orthodontists" in town and people know you.

Anderson Williams: 00:08:44

And so a lot of the growth and referrals come from multiple generations of patients.

Anderson Williams: 00:08:49

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:08:49

And at that point, you know, I gotta assume you're running a significantly bigger business through all of that marketing new building and all those things.

Anderson Williams: 00:08:56

How did you adjust as the business owner side of being the orthodontist?

Anderson Williams: 00:09:01

Dr. Cassidy: Very poorly.

Anderson Williams: 00:09:03

Um, frankly, I'm definitely a very type-A control freak, my fingers on everything in the practice, and I was paying all the bills, doing payroll, doing all of that, but I never had a good mechanism to kind of pull myself away from doing less of that.

Anderson Williams: 00:09:20

Fast forward to 2022, 2023, when I started looking at partnering with SOP.

Anderson Williams: 00:09:26

Didn't really know what that was gonna be for me being a business owner, but once I signed and started realizing some of the tasks that they were gonna take away from me, I was glad to do that.

Anderson Williams: 00:09:38

It gave me a peace of mind that I could really just truly start focusing on being the orthodontist.

Anderson Williams: 00:09:44

Being the team leader.

Anderson Williams: 00:09:45

Being a servant leader that I've always wanted to do, just never had the opportunity to do it because I could never rest my brain.

Anderson Williams: 00:09:52

I was always taking work home or staying late at the office.

Anderson Williams: 00:09:55

I wasn't able to take care of my physical fitness the way I wanted to because I was always so ingrained in that and that's been one of the nice, really, the nice advantages.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:04

I've been able to have a better balance in my life because of my decision to partner with SOP.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:10

And frankly at age 56, but, okay, what is my exit strategy?

Anderson Williams: 00:10:13

How long do I wanna do this?

Anderson Williams: 00:10:15

So that was one of the key drivers that drove me to this.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:18

Yeah, how long and how, in the latter part of my career do I want to be practicing, right?

Anderson Williams: 00:10:23

Do I want to be swallowed by the business or is there a way to get back to being the orthodontist?

Anderson Williams: 00:10:28

That maybe you were closer to when you started your career before you were also running a large business.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:34

Dr. Cassidy: Oh, totally.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:35

And that's been a really a lot of joy.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:37

I tell everybody I'm so lucky.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:38

I love what I do.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:39

At this point, I don't have any interest to retire anytime soon because I get to do what I want to do.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:44

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:44

Isn't that, yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:45

Dr. Cassidy: It's the fun part.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:46

This is the good stuff.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:47

This is why I went into it.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:48

It wasn't to pay bills, it wasn't to write payroll.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:51

It wasn't to do some of the, what I would call mundane back office things, the things that make the business run, but it can overwhelm you.

Anderson Williams: 00:10:59

Well, it's interesting to hear even that evolution of thinking and triggering this idea of an exit strategy, but then also in that process, finding an opportunity to get back to doing what you love.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:11

To where exit strategy isn't necessarily so imminent.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:15

Dr. Cassidy: Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:15

I'm in no rush at this point.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:17

I'm really not.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:18

I mean, I truly enjoy, I get a lot of questions on that from patients you know, they bring like, you know, a 6-year-old in and how long, much longer are you gonna practice?

Anderson Williams: 00:11:26

I say, I have no plans to retire at this point.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:28

I say I love what I do, and I plan to be around here for quite a while.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:31

Yeah, you were feeling a little old before, and now when patients are asking, you're like, I'm not that old.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:37

Dr. Cassidy: I, I agree.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:37

You know, my gray hair all, you know.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:39

Kind of belies that.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:40

But uh, you know, my spirit has definitely revived since my partnership, I'll be honest with you, has really allowed me to take a step back and make some changes.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:50

Also, one of the biggest things that I've ever done, the greatest thing I've ever done recently was go through the Leadership Academy with you.

Anderson Williams: 00:11:56

Uh, it really opened my eyes to the parts of me that I'd forgotten that existed because you get so single-mindedly focused on business, business, business that you forget who you are and forget what your internal drives are and so for that, I thank you for bringing that alive in me.

Anderson Williams: 00:12:13

Oh gosh, it was my pleasure.

Anderson Williams: 00:12:14

And for those listening, this is how I met Dr. Cassidy was through the Leadership Academy.

Anderson Williams: 00:12:18

And you know, one of the questions I have about that is, here you are, you're in, we'll say the last third of your career.

Anderson Williams: 00:12:26

We won't put a hard number on it since we, it's evolving and you've been a successful orthodontist.

Anderson Williams: 00:12:32

You've built a successful practice.

Anderson Williams: 00:12:33

You're successful enough that the partnership with SOP happened.

Anderson Williams: 00:12:37

I think a lot of people would say, why would you need a Leadership Academy experience?

Anderson Williams: 00:12:41

Why would that be something?

Anderson Williams: 00:12:42

It seems like you've done it like you're successful.

Anderson Williams: 00:12:45

Say a little bit about maybe what you were looking for in that partnership or that opportunity rather, and why you were looking for it.

Anderson Williams: 00:12:55

Dr. Cassidy: I think at this point I would call a seasoned orthodontist.

Anderson Williams: 00:12:58

My techniques, my methods, it's kind of, it's like clockwork.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:01

You're rolling like that.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:02

So what other areas do we want to grow in?

Anderson Williams: 00:13:04

What's the next thing you can grow?

Anderson Williams: 00:13:06

Well, to me the obvious one is leadership.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:08

My leadership skills were fairly lacking and you don't get a lot of that in dental school.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:11

You definitely don't get any of it in your residency.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:13

You just, you kind of have to learn it either through hard knocks or whatever like that.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:17

So I was like, okay, this is something that I could look forward to to become the best leader that I can be.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:23

Then why did I want to do it again?

Anderson Williams: 00:13:25

I think it opens up another part of your life and your brain.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:29

That's not strictly mechanics, and it's not the bottom line of financials.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:33

It's truly becoming the servant leader that you need to be for your team.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:37

To make life more worthwhile.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:39

You know, we can all just go in and go through the routine, but if you don't know why you're doing it and you don't have that inner passion, or not just straightening teeth, but you know, leading your team, helping them out, being a mentor.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:52

I feel like you're missing a big part of your life because, you know, ultimately when I'm done retiring.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:56

People are going to remember my smiles, probably not.

Anderson Williams: 00:13:59

What do I want them to remember is that I was kind, our team was great, we practiced in a way that made them feel special.

Anderson Williams: 00:14:07

That's what people will remember about you, and that's kind of the legacy play that I'm looking for, at this point.

Anderson Williams: 00:14:13

And just for context, through the Leadership Academy, we talk about building trust with your team.

Anderson Williams: 00:14:18

We talk about communication, we talk about healthy conflict, we talk about problem solving.

Anderson Williams: 00:14:23

We talk about running better meetings.

Anderson Williams: 00:14:25

We talk about leading change.

Anderson Williams: 00:14:27

We talk about a whole range of things leading through others.

Anderson Williams: 00:14:30

How do you see yourself now practicing differently?

Anderson Williams: 00:14:34

And have you had any feedback from your team or have you seen things change in your team as a result of some of those practices that you picked up?

Anderson Williams: 00:14:42

Dr. Cassidy: In terms of the practice, I've definitely gotten better with conflict resolution or having conflict.

Anderson Williams: 00:14:49

Not anybody's favorite thing, but you realize it's just part of doing it.

Anderson Williams: 00:14:52

'cause you know, I remember the quote, the absence of conflict is not harmony, it's apathy.

Anderson Williams: 00:14:56

That really stuck with me.

Anderson Williams: 00:14:58

Adam Grant.

Anderson Williams: 00:14:59

Dr. Cassidy: Because I was very, very adept at running from conflict, and now I don't enjoy it, but it's just something you have to do.

Anderson Williams: 00:15:06

And what my team has realized that as we have these conversations, it shows that we actually care about them and they need the feedback.

Anderson Williams: 00:15:12

I didn't realize that at the time until I went through the academy and started doing those kind of things.

Anderson Williams: 00:15:17

The other thing, as a leader, I feel it's my responsibility to, at our morning huddle to give them something more than just, here's the schedule, here's this.

Anderson Williams: 00:15:25

And so every day I read them a leadership quote and I tell a dad joke.

Anderson Williams: 00:15:28

No, the dad jokes are horrible, but I want to get those off to a good start, but, but I do believe it, it's important.

Anderson Williams: 00:15:34

And I've got a couple team members who take some, they really believe in, they're plastered all over their area, and the patients and the parents that come back, they actually look at those and they're like, Hey, that's really cool.

Anderson Williams: 00:15:45

What a neat quote that is.

Anderson Williams: 00:15:47

And so I feel like that's a bigger picture than within just my walls.

Anderson Williams: 00:15:51

I believe there's some great things out there and not to get sappy or anything like that, but we all just had some more of those soft skills and things like that.

Anderson Williams: 00:16:00

I think our world would be a better place.

Anderson Williams: 00:16:01

I really do.

Anderson Williams: 00:16:02

And the interactions with the team are so much better than they ever used to be.

Anderson Williams: 00:16:06

One of the things that we've had the chance to talk about since the Leadership Academy and did during the Leadership Academy was the topic on leading and managing change that I know resonated specifically with you.

Anderson Williams: 00:16:16

Will you just share a little bit about why that particular topic resonated so much with you, and then we can dig into some more details, but why did that one particularly grab you?

Anderson Williams: 00:16:26

Dr. Cassidy: Because I'm so adverse to change.

Anderson Williams: 00:16:27

I think a lot of us are, it gets us out of our comfort zone, things like that.

Anderson Williams: 00:16:31

But I just remember sitting there as you were going and introducing the change management model, and I was just thinking to myself, gosh, I wish I'd had this model as I was going through my process of, of signing and integrating and getting every onboarding and doing those kind of things.

Anderson Williams: 00:16:46

It was, no one had ever taught me about change management before.

Anderson Williams: 00:16:50

You know, change truly another four letter word for most teams.

Anderson Williams: 00:16:53

You go to a course, oh, I'm so excited to do X, Y, and Z. And the staff and the team, they're hoping that, oh my God, please let 'em forget about it.

Anderson Williams: 00:17:00

Don't say anything for a week and it'll go away.

Anderson Williams: 00:17:01

This gave me the tools to implement the change that I needed to understanding what the team members are hearing and what their feelings are and what I need to do to foster the change.

Anderson Williams: 00:17:12

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:17:12

And I think often, you know, in your position there's an assumption like you're gonna make this decision to partner and that's better for the business.

Anderson Williams: 00:17:20

And you know why it's better for the business in your own mind.

Anderson Williams: 00:17:22

And then so you just sort of take for granted, and you look out to your team, you think, oh, their job's not really gonna change.

Anderson Williams: 00:17:27

And so they shouldn't be worried about it.

Anderson Williams: 00:17:29

So then you don't need to communicate much to 'em about it.

Anderson Williams: 00:17:31

And what you don't realize is they know you're out of town more often than you're used to.

Anderson Williams: 00:17:35

They know your door's closed or your schedule's slightly different.

Anderson Williams: 00:17:38

And they're wondering why that is, and they're gonna fill that change with their own story.

Anderson Williams: 00:17:41

And that story is gonna be a whole lot worse than your story.

Anderson Williams: 00:17:44

And I think that that's one of those things that sometimes we can fall in the trap to say, no, I've got this, I'll take care of it.

Anderson Williams: 00:17:50

But not recognizing that in the absence of our communicating with our team.

Anderson Williams: 00:17:54

They're making up their own stories and their fears are surging the same way, even if they have nothing to fear.

Anderson Williams: 00:18:00

And so I know we talked a lot about that, whether you're answering the phones or you're entering data or you're a technician or you're another doctor, if you don't know what's going on, but you know something's going on, you're natural inclination is either to fear or to resist.

Anderson Williams: 00:18:15

Dr. Cassidy: Totally, and I knew why I wanted to partner.

Anderson Williams: 00:18:17

I deep down knew why I didn't do a really good job of explaining it a hundred percent to the team and I didn't prep them the way that I wish I would have prior to the integration process.

Anderson Williams: 00:18:29

I just kind of poo-pooed it and said, nothing's gonna change.

Anderson Williams: 00:18:32

It's all gonna be good.

Anderson Williams: 00:18:33

Well, worst thing I ever said, because there was a lot of change and people are naturally resistant to change, especially people who had been with me for quite a while, who were in more back office positions that things were gonna change and there was legit concern that they were gonna lose their job or they'd have to do things so radically different that they just didn't wanna learn something new.

Anderson Williams: 00:18:54

And in retrospect, that's part of why that day it was so earth shattering to me that I had not prepped my team the proper way to accept the change.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:04

Now everything is great, everything is fine, but that first six months was a major struggle.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:09

And again, it's.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:10

No mal intent, right?

Anderson Williams: 00:19:12

You're thinking you're making the best decision.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:14

You know, people's jobs aren't on the line.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:15

You know they're gonna take care of the team.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:17

But on the other side, your team's going, well, wait.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:19

We have this great practice.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:20

We love working together.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:22

We love our community.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:23

We love our brand that we've built together, and everybody says it's great.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:27

Why are we changing?

Anderson Williams: 00:19:28

Dr. Cassidy: Yeah, and you're right, because there was concern.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:30

Are they gonna rebrand us?

Anderson Williams: 00:19:31

Are they gonna relabel us?

Anderson Williams: 00:19:32

How the phone's gonna be answered?

Anderson Williams: 00:19:33

Are people gonna be watching our computers all day long listening in conversations?

Anderson Williams: 00:19:38

And we had not had those conversations.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:40

And that was a mistake because that just breeds doubt and definitely you can feel the tension that's palpable in the office.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:48

During those times.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:49

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:49

Where there was a lot of confusion and one of the things I had told them I would do is every Friday we'd have a meeting about it.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:55

Well, then Friday would come and we'd be so busy and we just, oh, okay, we'll talk about it next week.

Anderson Williams: 00:19:59

Well, no, that's not the way to do it.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:01

You just gotta keep people updated.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:03

You've got to have honest, frank conversations with everything.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:07

Yeah, even when you don't know the answer, right?

Anderson Williams: 00:20:09

Like it's not just that you're not saying anything until you have all the answers.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:12

There's something to be said for saying, well, this is the why and this is where we're going, but I don't know that detail yet, but I'm gonna find out.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:19

Dr. Cassidy: And just being honest with them.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:21

And if they have a question, you don't know the answer to it, don't make something up.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:24

Just say, I don't know.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:25

But I will find somebody who does know the answer, and we'll get that answer to you as soon as possible.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:31

If you had to sort of say like a couple of things, if you were to summarize that experience, what would you recommend to that founder, that seller, as it relates to what you would've done differently in terms of working with your team, communicating through change?

Anderson Williams: 00:20:45

What would you advise?

Anderson Williams: 00:20:46

Just any ideas.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:47

Dr. Cassidy: First thing I would've done is I would've been much more transparent from the beginning.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:51

Once I've kind of agreed in part to doing this while I was going through the due diligence, I would've began to have some conversations with the team.

Anderson Williams: 00:20:59

First thing I would've done is gone to a couple of my people who've been with me for a long time, who kind of were the leaders in the practice, and I would've pulled them aside and had a private conversation and explained exactly what I was doing, what was gonna happen, and just get feedback from them and get input from them.

Anderson Williams: 00:21:16

That would've been the absolute number one thing that would've saved us from quite a bit of the issues that we had.

Anderson Williams: 00:21:22

I think truly, if you had to summarize the absolute one, right, like that's probably it.

Anderson Williams: 00:21:27

I mean, you are making a decision as the business owner that impacts your whole team.

Anderson Williams: 00:21:33

The sooner you can have more people, particularly people with influence, that share your vision and share your direction so that they don't have to come to you for all the answers, or it's not singularly trusting you that it's gonna be the right thing for everybody, but they can talk to other people who have different kinds of influence on them as team members, the safer the whole process gets.

Anderson Williams: 00:21:55

Right?

Anderson Williams: 00:21:55

Dr. Cassidy: Oh, totally.

Anderson Williams: 00:21:56

Because as kind of leaders within the practice, they're getting asked, bombarded with questions because the team members don't wanna come talk to me.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:03

They're not afraid, but they may not feel it's to their place to ask and they kind of wanna go through an intermediary.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:08

Well, if the intermediary doesn't know the answers either they're gonna start making stuff up, which is even worse.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:14

Or they're just gonna be silent and silence leads to like, oh hmm something bad is gonna happen.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:21

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:21

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:22

We fill silence with the negative almost always.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:25

And whether it's this sort of size practice or you're looking at larger change in an organization, the worst case scenario is your management level.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:34

Whatever that means for you goes, you know, I don't know.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:36

That's what corporate told me to do, which is the agr.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:39

I don't know.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:39

That's just what the doctor told me to do.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:41

Right?

Anderson Williams: 00:22:41

Like it just totally blows up any opportunity to buy into the change.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:46

Dr. Cassidy: Totally.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:47

And then you're chasing your tail.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:48

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:48

For a long time.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:49

You're doing damage repair as opposed to it being this celebration of something that really is bigger and better.

Anderson Williams: 00:22:56

You're putting fires out all the time and that takes away from the transition tremendously.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:02

Given where you are today, where you are in your career, as the partnership with SOP has worked and has actually helped you kind of reframe and rethink what your horizon is and you're find a little bit of a different perspective on your practice, what's next for you?

Anderson Williams: 00:23:18

Like as you think about that now as you're sitting here today, where do you continue to grow?

Anderson Williams: 00:23:23

How do you continue to grow?

Anderson Williams: 00:23:24

What's next for your practice?

Anderson Williams: 00:23:25

Where's your head in that process now?

Anderson Williams: 00:23:27

Dr. Cassidy: Practice is growing so well, don't break it if it's working.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:31

Yeah, don't break it just in my mind, I'm just gonna continue to develop my leadership skills, interpersonal skills, that really, at this point is about it.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:40

I, I don't have any overarching plans.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:43

At this point.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:44

Enjoy your work.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:45

Dr. Cassidy: Enjoy my work.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:45

Enjoy your team.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:46

Dr. Cassidy: Enjoy reading books.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:48

Yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:48

That I've never gotten, yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:49

To read on leadership and life.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:52

That really is it.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:53

I got a window that, uh, I joke with everybody maybe five to seven years.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:58

I don't know.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:58

I love it so much.

Anderson Williams: 00:23:59

I don't even want to think about it.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:00

I, and I've got.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:01

That's already shifted a little bit.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:03

Dr. Cassidy: Well, yeah.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:04

'cause at first it was three to five and now it's gone to five to seven.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:06

And yeah, just, you know, begin to really enjoy the fruits of my labor.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:10

Maybe take a little bit more time off.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:12

The biggest thing is just being able to enjoy my evenings and weekends again, without being like, oh, I have to do the books.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:19

I have to do this, I have to do that.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:20

No, I get to do what I wanna do on the weekends, either for myself or as a couple with my wife and I. And that's probably been one of the biggest impacts of partnering with SOP.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:29

It really has given my life back.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:38

This podcast was produced by Shore Capital Partners and recorded in the Andrew Malone Podcast Studio with story and narration by Anderson Williams.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:45

Recording by Austin Johnson.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:47

Editing by Reel Audiobooks.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:49

Sound design, mixing, and mastering by Mark Galup of Reel Audiobooks.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:53

Special thanks to Dr. Kevin Cassidy.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:56

This podcast is the property of Shore Capital Partners, LLC.

Anderson Williams: 00:24:59

None of the content herein is investment advice, an offer of investment advisory services, nor a recommendation or offer relating to any security.

Anderson Williams: 00:25:07

See the terms of use page on the Shore Capital website for other important information.