Transcript
Speaker: Dental Fuel, the podcast that focuses on what no one else is talking about. Mistakes. The dental world is full of before and afters and no one is talking about the middle. Dental Fuel brings you the unspoken in -between. Dental Fuel is brought to you by Ignite DDS Coaching, empowering dentists to build self -determined futures.
Speaker: Together, we're shaping the next generation of leaders in dentistry. Money, money, money. Money and false promises oftentimes go hand in hand. In this episode, Lauren talks about taking a lucrative job that did not align with her personal values or aspirations. Lauren King dives into past financial mistakes and hard lessons that she has learned along the way. Many lessons that we can learn from too. Let's tune in.
Speaker: i know that you know I know that many hygienists, they can make a career out ah out of temping and it can be ah very fruitful and something that's very fulfilling for many hygienists. But have you found that it has led to any financial issues? And I'd like to lead into any financial mistakes that maybe you have encountered potentially related to this or or not.
Speaker: I have. i've i've made To be honest with you, I've made several financial mistakes in my adult life. i was not taught Anything I know now financially is self -taught. It's just one of those things my parents didn't teach me, not because they didn't want to, but they were also struggling. so you know How can you teach something that you don't know yourself? so I started off kind of in a ah negative space. I've been working since I was 14 years old.
Speaker: so i've I've been in this battle for a long time, but I would say in my professional life what I would consider a monumental financial mistake is taking a job because of the salary, knowing that it's not in alignment with who you are or where your values are or what your journey is supposed to be.
Speaker: Salary is not everything. If anything, it's the least important thing that you should be worrying about and you'll learn that as soon as you start making that paycheck and you understand and feel that nothing has changed. Nothing has changed and now you're working for someone that you don't respect or that doesn't respect you or just completely negates you in totality.
Speaker: so I unfortunately had to learn a very, very tough, very, very long and hard lesson of you cannot let anything financial determine what you're going to do with your life. It's the last thing.
Speaker: that's a That's a strong message as well, too. it It can be really hard, especially, you know, there are bills to pay. Those bills sometimes stack up. And even in a bad setting, there can be a pretty penny set forth in front of you and it can be hard to walk away. What would your message be to our listeners who may be in a similar situation where, hey, they're making a they're making a good buck, but for their mental health, maybe it's not the right place for them?
Speaker: One, my biggest thing, one of the biggest lessons I learned in that specific scenario was have an attorney look at everything. Everything. If you are signing an offer letter, an attorney needs to look over it. I don't care if they're the best attorney or the worst attorney, get an attorney's eyes on it. Make sure you are not signing your life over your intellectual property over. I don't think people realize because we're just not taught. No one taught me any of that.
Speaker: you you're literally signing over your entire being in some of those offer letters and all I could see were the zeros and how I had finally you know stepped into this role and all of these things and none of that mattered. So one of my biggest pieces of advice is please have someone look over that offer letter for you. Do your research.
Speaker: on the people that you are going to be working for. Dig deeper than just Googling them. Do actual research. See their negative sides. See their positive sides. If it sounds too good to be true, the age -old saying is it probably is too good to be true. Nothing is that good.
Speaker: But do your research, have someone advocate for you just as you should advocate for yourself. But there are some things in business, especially in the dental industry that we just don't know. No one ever teaches us, even clinically. There's offer letters that you can sign clinically where you you literally become their property in terms of they can say and do whatever they want with your time with your intellectual property. They can say you can't go work for anyone else even if you need the money. Always do your due diligence and always have someone do it for you as well just to cover yourself.
Speaker: Yes, absolutely. Having a lawyer on hand or, you know, at least somebody who's trained to have some eyes on legal documents is really important because like you said, you are signing almost what, you know, almost your life away, right? Literally. And when it, when it comes to know non -competes, that can really come and bite you in the butt. If you decide to leave the practice and you want to live in the area and now you can't find another job, that can be very challenging.
Speaker: Are non -compete fairly popular for dental hygienists as well? So if you are not not clinically, I wouldn't say. I haven't run into that myself at least. But on a more business level or i typically what I'm hired for is an education position like a director of education or director of business development or something like that.
Speaker: Absolutely. You are 100 % usually going to be asked to sign a non -compete if you split ways. And that includes your intellectual property. So anyone that doesn't understand what that means, that quite literally means anything that your brain thought about, came up with, pushed social media, all of that is intellectual property and they now own that from the time that you worked with them.
Speaker: which means if you go share that intellectual property with another company that could be considered a direct competitor to them, they can seriously go after you for it. Do they do that? Usually not, unless it's a serious threat or something like that. But can they? 100%, yes they can.
Speaker: Lauren, I know that your practice setting is just a little bit different. You know, you're kind of on your own, doing your own thing, ah being a girl boss, which is very, very cool. From a financial perspective, for those who are listening and are curious if maybe this is an option for them, would you say that it has been rewarding for you? Yes. For me,
Speaker: Being a travel hygienist and making my own schedule and you know being able to go and speak when I need to speak or go and Promote myself at a conference when I need to do that. I've always had that in my back pocket. If I picked up a corporate job and it didn't work out like we were just talking about, I always had that in my back pocket. You can always go back and just work clinically. So I will be the first one to say that I did not become a dental hygienist because I've been dreaming about cleaning teeth since I was a kid, no. I went into dental hygiene
Speaker: because I wanted a career that was going to take care of me. And that was a fail safe because like I said, I grew up, you know, not having that. And so to me, it was the most important thing. It actually took me two times to get into dental hygiene school. I fricking hate standardized testing.
Speaker: I'm right there with you. I hear you. I hate it. I hate it. No, ask me to go do something with my hands. Don't ask me to do math. My brain is like, no, absolutely not. But you know it it was one of those things. I went into it because I knew that it was always going to be there. I knew that it was always going to be needed. And bonus was we make really good money. So I would say that it's absolutely rewarded me in a clinical capacity from a speaker's capacity I wish someone would have told me when I first started speaking five years ago how much money it was going to cost me to get to where I am now all this time later and I'm just now in the last year and a half getting paid. So it took
Speaker: like three years at least of me going to conferences, of me going to study clubs, of me just showing up in any capacity, getting my name out there and basically begging to speak or offering to speak for free for at least three years before even even anything came out of it financially. So one thing I would say to anyone wanting to start a career in speaking is it is absolutely rewarding. It's another one of those things. It's the one job I would do for free.
Speaker: And you will, for a while. And if you love it, and this is your your your passion, your journey, whatever it is, you won't stop. You will be insatiable, you will be obsessed, but it takes a lot. you it It's a lot of investment up front. It's a lot.
Speaker: There really is. Yeah. I've heard that from other speakers on, you know, it it may seem very lucrative, but it is a lot of hard work, ah hard work and the on the back end and preparing and traveling and ah you're right. You got to kind of ah put your your time in and oftentimes you will do a lot of free gigs per se before you start getting paid and that's okay. Cause I'm sure, ah I'm sure now you're being sought out. Yes. Now, you know, it's a different story.
Speaker: and I'm getting more inbound than I am having to do outbound. This is year five. So, you know, it's like, thank goodness. But just, I would also say though, if it is your passion and it is, you know, you know that you're being called to do this or whatever it is, don't stop, figure out a way to do it. If you're, you know, not making that much money clinically and you're you're in an office, you know, just a solo office or anything like that maybe consider going to being a travel hygienist or something because you do need that flexibility and volatility of it's constantly changing. I've been called two weeks before a conference that a speaker is sick or they just can't make it for whatever reason. Hey, can you come speak? Yeah, I gotta go. Now I have to cancel all my shifts. Does that suck? Yes, but it's part of the job. It is that volatile. Ready to take the next step in your journey? Book an intro call with Ignite DDS coaching today and level up your future in dentistry. What an episode! As we learned, salary is in everything. We hope that you continue to listen to our conversation with Warren, where we talk about a team mistake.
