🛹 We're back for another episode of Kinda Different! In this episode, Matt chats with Zachary Shelley, the office manager at Satellite Family Dentistry and a former professional skateboarder. They discuss the role of technology in innovation and how it enhances various aspects of dental practice, such as patient communication, data analysis, and imaging. They also touch on the importance of thinking differently and using technology to create more elegant solutions in patient care. The conversation highlights the intersection of skateboarding and dentistry in Zachary's career journey. In this conversation, Zachary Shelley and Matt Allen discuss the importance of serving patients and the role of patients in innovation. They emphasize the need for a genuine relationship between healthcare providers and patients, where patients feel listened to and valued. They also highlight the significance of getting back to the basics and focusing on fundamental principles in patient care.
Listen in on Apple/Spotify or watch below:
You can get in touch with Zachary here:Email: zach@satellitefamilydentistry.com
Dental Office Manager Success Network Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/share/KosoVuam3VNA9c9z/
Transcript:
Welcome to another episode of Kinda Different, an amazing, fabulous, awesome dental podcast where we talk about innovation in dental care. We interview some of the most amazing guests that are out there, and we talk together about how we can all make dental care more human. I am Dr. Matt Allen, CEO and co-founder of DifferentKind, and your host for Kinda Different.
And I used some of those words today, amazing, awesome. I should probably say radical, because our guest today is an amazing dental professional, but I do not, I am 100% positive. We've had some Canadians on the show.
We've had some different people on the show. We have never had a professional skateboarder. And that changes today with Zach Shelley, who is the office manager at Satellite Family Dentistry and a former professional skateboarder.
So somebody who is a legit dude in terms of, can go out there and get gnarly. Certainly that's close to my heart, because when I went to dental school, I wanted to be an orthodontist with a skate park out behind my dental office, so I could just go skate with the teenagers, while I was not seeing patients. So Zach, thanks so much for taking the time to join us today.
We'd love for you to just give us a quick intro to yourself, and then we'll dive in to some questions.
Awesome. Thanks, Matt. Thanks for having me on the show.
Super excited to chat and talk dentistry, and a little bit of skateboarding. Like Dr. Matt had said, my previous life, I was a professional skateboarder, which a lot of you are probably wondering, how does Zachary go along with dentistry, right? Like nobody's ever really heard that.
And I'm not actually sure if there's any other pro skaters that are in the dental industry. So I might be the one and only. But I started at a very young age, around six years old skateboarding, and had just a dream and passion for that.
And that drove obviously through most of my life and to my young career, in my early 20s, and did that professionally for about 15 years. And a friend of mine was also a professional skateboarder, and his dad was a dental technician. And as the family follows, he followed in the dental technology, and he was looking for somebody to work for him.
And I knew him through the skateboarding industry, and wanted to start a family, wanted to be able to kind of settle down a little bit, because skateboarding is fast, it's hard, it's not easy on the body, it's a crazy industry. And so I started driving for him, and we'll fast forward 11 years of that. I was managing a dental lab and growing the dental lab, and learning everything about dental technology.
And rewind from today, four years, almost to the date, my current boss had reached out to me and said, hey, I want to have lunch with you. And he offered me a job to run his practice. And I just dove deep into clinical dentistry the last four years ago into this practice and seen some great growth.
And it's been an amazing journey. So I'm looking forward to continue that and continue to grow dentistry as a whole, and also growing our practice.
Awesome, man. Well, that's a great story. I love all, we have way more to dive into at a conference sometime.
But let's certainly, certainly, we could spend the whole 25 minutes like just in that story, right?
Yeah.
But let's, in the sake of time, we'll keep moving. Although I do want to say, I love, I absolutely love talking with operators, right? And so essentially your role office manager, which is effectively your COO of a very large practice, right?
Like you have 24 chairs, right?
Uh, 23, actually.
So, yeah, close. A lot, right? Uh, it's a lot of, a lot of things that are happening, right?
And so, uh, I just love talking with operators because I think sometimes, you know, I certainly appreciate, you know, all the different roles on the C-suite. Um, and, but I am not an operator in some ways. And so talking with people who can like just make stuff happen and, you know, uh, really just, yeah, GSD, right, I think is the good acronym that's out there for what you do often.
Um, really, really makes me, uh, just kind of look up with in awe. So super excited to hear your perspective on a lot of this stuff and dive in. So let's get to it.
You had already mentioned dental technology. Let's start with innovation. Yeah, we always do.
Um, I think it's interesting because when people think of technology, I think that kind of goes hand in hand with innovation. But I am a philosopher at heart, you know, in some ways, certainly not by degree, but at heart maybe. And I do think that there are differences, right?
And so what, what would be your perspective when you think about innovation and technology? What do you think technology's role is in innovation?
So technology's role in innovation, it play, it's multifaceted, right? Like, so when we're looking at the dental practice, it's not just whatever technology we can do to serve the patient or just serve the practice, right? Like, we have technology that's integrated into our practice that serves a role in each individual aspect of how we do things.
So it plays a role in how we talk to our patients through the phone, right? And how that writes back into the software. It writes into how we look at our numbers in our practice from day to day and how we track that and see our growth to the nth degree, right?
We used to not have that ability. We'd sit there, write reports. We'd look at every little number and we'd do the math.
We'd find percentages. Now, we have softwares that actually do all this for us, which is incredible. It makes our patient interaction seamless when they're coming through the door with digital forms.
Our imagery, AI has played a huge role in dentistry and it's continuing to grow. I believe that's going to be a driving factor through dentistry as we look at the next few years moving forward. I think dentistry and technology, and then looking at innovation, it's a full-rounded multifaceted driver that one can't work without the other, in my opinion.
Especially in today's age, technology is such a big proponent of our culture in America, but also the whole world. We're tied to our phones, we're tied to our computers, we're tied to any device we possibly can be.
Yeah, it's interesting because I think, obviously when you talk about innovation, a lot of people would be like, what's the most innovative company out there? People would probably say Apple. What's the motto of Apple and it's Think Different?
When I think about innovation from the perspective of, innovation is us pushing the bounds of thinking and doing something differently than doing something differently. I think technology can be an enabler in that in some ways, and it seems like that's what you're saying in terms of, cool, we're not just going to implement technology for the sake of it. We want to have better interactions on the phone with our patients, or we want them to feel like this part of their journey was smoother, or this part of our crafting our KPIs and calculating those and reporting on those is just more efficient.
There's a guy, we've talked about him on the podcast before, Dr. Victor Montori. He works at Mayo Clinic, and he's written a book called Why We Revolt, which is essentially like, hey, patients deserve better. What can this new manifesto essentially be for patient care?
But it's super interesting because I think he talks about this idea of moving from being efficient to being elegant, and I think that's a great way of thinking about how technology can make things more efficient. But only if you're thinking differently can it actually make things more elegant, and if you're enabling technology to allow you to do that elegance, then that works for everyone type of thing.
That's such a good point. I don't think I've ever heard it delivered that way, and I love that because when we look at it in our practice, it's not just like, oh, cool, this is the new next latest greatest thing. Like, let's just do it.
Like, I look into like, how is this going to benefit who we serve? And honestly, me as running operations in the practice, we serve our patients, but also serve my team. Like, my role is to grow my team and to be better every single day.
So how is it going to make my patients experience better, but also how is it going to make my teams experience better? So it's really cool to hear that analogy of being more elegant with it. I'm going to have to steal that and use that.
Elegant empathy, which is what you just described of like, how am I serving the needs of the people that I'm working with, whether that's my team, my patients, whatever, which is obviously an empathetic response. So yeah, absolutely. Cool, man.
I love that perspective. Certainly, yeah, really, really appreciate that. It's kind of in line with that, right?
So let's keep on the same train of like serving the people well and serving patients well. I've always been a big believer in the fact that patients are not the recipients of care, right? They're partners in care.
And so certainly have a role not only in, you know, choosing the care that's right for them or whatever, but as you think about innovation as well, that they probably have a role in that as well. So I'm always curious to hear from people who are thinking differently, you know, what role do you think that, what role do you see patients having in innovation?
Yeah, so it kind of makes my brain tick a little bit with like my old dental technology career, right? Like I was trained in classic dental tech education. So back from the 50s books, all my books were black and white.
There's no gloves on, you know, working on these patients and you're looking at like, oh man, that is so gross because it's like, why aren't you wearing gloves? But that's how it was, right? And the reason it makes me think so much is because, you know, I learned brass flasking and plaster work and everything old school.
And now we're looking at today, everything's 3D printed and scanned, and it's also streamlined and pretty. And what I see is the patient, as we're learning how we do things better, they deserve the best. And they play a role in when we're able to use this technology for the patient, we're able to educate them better, we're able to give them an experience that we weren't able to give them before.
And also, they're able to give us feedback. So when we utilize this technology, we're able to sit there and say, hey, what do you think about this? Like I sit patients down, I'm like, hey, I want to show you something really cool.
We integrated this AI on our software and I want you to see, does this help you understand your treatment better? And getting that patient feedback, I think, is one of the biggest ones. Because like you said, it's perfect example.
They are partnering with us. They're the reason we're a business. Yes, they're the reason we get paid, everybody.
But they are the partner in order for us to be able to do our job to the best of our ability. And we should be talking to our patients and saying, hey, what do you think about this scan here? Like, is this something that you think you're getting value from with us utilizing?
Or look at this, you know, our forums. I ask patients all the time, is there anything that we're doing that we could do better? And I love that feedback because it's so important to get to know where your patient is.
But like with dental technology, it's the same thing. When I would do a full arch case, I'm like, what are you wanting in the long run? Like when we're all said and done with this, what are your expectations?
And you'd be blown away what these people expect. It's not have a pretty smile. They're wanting foundational things in their life to change.
So once you know that mindset of your patient, that's what made me successful in my dental tech career, is because I could find the root of the problem, the root of what they're trying to fix. It's not just their teeth. They're trying to fix so many other things that we may not be able to fix, but at least I understand what they're trying to fix.
So then I can meet them where they're at and say, okay, this is what I can do. So it's the same thing when we're looking at a clinical practice is let's find out where these patients are at and what we're utilizing, and how does that work well for them? And if it doesn't, what can we change to make that even better?
Dude, you're speaking my language, obviously. Obviously, DifferentKind, we value the opinions of patients and giving that back to practices. So man, totally.
I love that. But even without using DifferentKind, you can sit a patient up and say, hey, how did this work for you? And just having that conversation can be so important.
I do think sometimes, especially in dentistry, we have a lot of people who are just like, get very nerdy about products. That's just, I think, a general, oh, look at how cool this thing is, right? And we might think it's cool, but a patient might not.
And one of the things that I would always do when I was seeing patients was like, hey, do you want to see x-rays, right? And some people don't, you know? Whereas I just actually don't wanna look at those.
I don't care, tell me what the diagnosis is, but I don't wanna see it. And so it's like, sometimes we think it's cool. Like, hey, look at this new AI radiograph that I can show you, but if they don't wanna see it, and it's actually more helpful for them not to see it, great, we can have that conversation without looking at that picture necessarily.
So yeah, to your point of just getting that feedback involving those people, I absolutely love that. And certainly, yes, 100%, you will never find a bigger cheerleader for me, or bigger cheerleader about what you just said than me. So I love it.
Awesome. Sweet man, well, you've recently done some cool stuff with your life, let's move on to the Connection. Obviously, I love your story too, just from the perspective of when I met my wife, I was wearing a backwards baseball hat and whatever, and had a big beard, and she's like, I never would have guessed that you were in dental school.
I meet people all the time, they're like, you don't look like a dentist. I'm like, well, what does a dentist look like? I don't know.
What are you supposed to look like, right? So you've done some really cool things in your life that are varying, but you've done some really cool stuff in dentistry recently. I saw on LinkedIn that you got a new letter in front of your acronyms on your name, walked across the stage at ADOM with a graduation cap on or whatever.
So congratulations on that. So obviously, you're just out there crushing this and making stuff happen. What would you say as you think about yourself?
What goals do you have for yourself personally, professionally? Fill us in on where Zach sees himself over the coming year.
Awesome. Thanks, man. Yeah.
So that was huge at ADOM. Their delegation process is a great way to push yourself. Skateboarding in a good and bad way has taught me to always push myself to my limits, right?
And like I said, that can be good and bad. Broken bones are bad, but in a career, when you're pushing the limits, you accomplish things that you've pushed yourself through. This has challenged me to be a published author and written articles in national publications and also local in the organization, which was a huge accomplishment.
And I have some stuff coming up, so I'm going to Smiles for Life Foundation down in Dominican Republic for 10 days to do dentistry down there, which I'm super excited about. And I'm currently working on my diplomat delegation with ADOM, so I have a lot more publications to work on this year. So I'm definitely looking forward with that.
But I'm just, I'm kind of looking for the next latest and greatest thing. I completed a organizational leadership program through Harvard Business School a couple of months ago. And I think dentistry is always evolving, right?
And we kind of have to innovate ourselves. We have to look like truly down, like, what are we doing? And I think the biggest thing I can take away, at least with my professional career, is I want this next year to really make a difference in dentistry.
And it's not that it's a Zach Shelley show and I want it about me, but I want to be an impact of where I'm able to come alongside other office managers and dentists and say, I was able to make a difference in your practice, whether it's financially or whether it's relational, right? Like if you loving the industry, I think we've made dentistry very difficult for ourselves over many years and I think there's ways that we can improve that and I would love to be a part of that. So that's what I'm looking forward to, at least in the next year and continue that further.
I love it, man. I love it. Those are great goals and certainly, yeah, I mean, you can tell the humility that's coming through in there.
And you can tell when people want to make it a show all about them, right? But I think to your point, right? Like we all have to assess where our organizational power kind of lies in terms of like, how can we influence things?
How can we change things for the better? Ultimately, with that kind of epithetic approach. So I love it.
Yes. Excited to see what you accomplished and excited to follow along with that journey. I also know that when you're doing a lot of things like you are, sometimes that can lead itself to like, hey, I'm busy all the time.
I'm at the office and I'm doing all these things outside of the office. I got stuff going on at home and whatever, and that can lead to burnout and that can lead to feeling stressed and all of those things. So I would like to think about just from the perspective of humanity, like I was learning from other people about that.
What do you do to kind of recenter, refocus, ground yourself, especially when you're doing a lot or the world feels chaotic?
Yeah, there's a lot of times I feel intense stress, and like we're talking pre-recording here, Matt, and the past three weeks have been insane. I've been out west twice within three weeks, lots of flights, lots of travel, excited for graduation, but then also lots of learning and teaching, and it's a lot to juggle. Then I have three boys and my beautiful wife, and we love to spend time together, so it's like, how do you balance all that?
I'm that personality, my wife will tell you, I don't stop, I don't sit down, it's hard for me to relax. But one thing I've talked about a few times to people, and maybe it's something that would be a great another podcast or something to write about is how to get back to the basics. We think about this all the time like with skateboarding.
Whenever I'm learning a new trick and I'm not doing what I'm wanting to do, I'm overthinking things. I'm trying to think too far forward. I have to center myself back down to like, what are my basics?
What do I actually need to get done? Because we end up clouding ourself with so much. It's any sport, you look at football, you look at baseball, you look at hockey, you look at soccer, everything goes down to your fundamentals.
One thing I always try to put myself back is, where fundamentally, where do I need to be right now? That means where do I need to be with my family, with my wife, my children, and then also my obligations at my job, and then also looking at myself and say, okay, for me, I need to take this day, and I just need to spend it how I need to spend it rather than just pounding things out and say, I'm going to be okay. Because what we do as humans is we suppress a lot of distress, we suppress a lot of the negativity.
We may be outward about it, but we don't actually talk about it or actually say, hey, I need to do this. I do have a couple of buddies that I love to talk to about work that are not in the dental industry. I really strongly encourage people just to find somebody outside of your industry that doesn't actually do it with you day to day, because what that ends up happening is same people in the same industry is like, you're bantering back and forth about your complaints, but you're not productive on anything.
Whereas you can say, hey, how are things at your job and it's completely different industry and you're like, oh, well, I can relate a little bit with this, but I don't know what to do in this, what would you say? It's really fun because having an outside perspective on something really brings light to things that you really wouldn't think about because we get these blinders on and we're just looking down one lane, and that's what stress does to us. But if we are able to open those up a bit and have a clearer field of view, then you're able to say, okay, this is not really how it is or I can control this because there's some stuff we can control and there's some we can't.
Things we can't, let it go. It's just how it's going to be for the moment. It's just how are you going to get through that.
I love to just one, take a little bit of step back, take some time for myself, but then also just go back to my fundamentals, back to the basics. I talked about it a couple of weeks ago, tell everybody the kiss method, keep it simple, stupid. Sometimes we get in the way of ourselves, and if we take that step back, it really helps just kind of ground you and know where you're at.
I love it, man. Well, you said two things there that I want to highlight, right? Number one is involving community and kind of the accountability around some of that, because I do think that that's so helpful.
When you're doing it by yourself, it is really hard sometimes, so I love that piece. And then yeah, the back to basics piece, man, I'm like 100% huge believer in something called a rule of life, which essentially is that, right? Of like, what are the things that are important to me?
And how do I structure my days, weeks, months, years around those kinds of things, right? So that I don't have to think about them, right? Like to me, that's such a valuable thing of like, basics are, like you mentioned, like overthinking, you start to get tripped up, right?
But if you're always trying to figure out like, oh, what is my day going to look like today, but you don't have just like a structure or rhythm of like, these are the most important things that I'm going to do, then it gets to be challenging. And so, yeah, that concept, right, of using something like a rule of life or whatever we want to call it to essentially help us focus on the basics and the things that we've said, hey, this is the most important thing, this is the biggest rock for me. It's going in first, right?
Versus letting the world overwhelm you, I think is super, super valuable. So love that. Yes, I mean, I am just super, like just find myself nodding my head along through our whole conversation.
Awesome. Love it.
Your kindred spirits, I think, in a lot of ways, so I appreciate it.
Awesome.
Let's move on to making dental care more human. Yeah, obviously, this is such an important area where I think some of, hey, who we are and how we think, right? The innovation piece and then the who we are piece really lends itself to those good relationships.
And so when you think of patient experience in general, what's one factor that you think is important but overlooked, just not focused on enough in the dental space right now?
Yeah, so we kind of touched on it a little bit, and it's kind of two-factored, right? One is talking to patients about things that they don't care about, right? Like you're getting too in-depth at the clinical that they really don't need to know because they didn't go to dental school and they're not, frankly, like 1% of your patients really want to know how exactly, you know, caries infiltrates the enamel into the dentin and how exactly the composite bonds to it.
Like most patients don't care what they really want, and this is the other part of it, is the relationship. I talked about this a couple weeks ago, and I'm truly passionate about it. It's like we are seeing these patients and they're entrusting us to work in their mouth.
Of all places, it's not we're going to work on your hands and do your nails or your feet, or give you a back massage, and that's way less intrusive. Like we're in their oral cavity working, while they're laying on their back. I mean, they're in such a vulnerable position as one, but then you're also having to trust them, and it's not an easy thing to do.
I mean, we're not going to sit there. I said this to a gentleman who was sitting in my class, and I just randomly just spit fire to him. I was like, hey, let me work in your mouth right now.
And he's like, no, I don't want to do that. And I was like, right, because you don't know me. If you knew me, you might say, hey, yeah, I'm cool with that.
Like, show them, but you don't know me. So I think one of the biggest things we need to work on is actually having relationships with our patients that are genuine. Because if you don't, you're really not gonna be successful in the way you want to be.
You can grow up practicing, you can do well, but there is an aspect of growing a practice that is strong and that's driving and thriving through the industry when you actually treat your patients like you truly care about them. So things like, I see our one of our, the owner dentist, he's amazing at this, is like he's super genuine with our patients. He has a mind like I've never seen before, like he remembers everything.
But what our other, all of our other team members will write notes in the clinical chart, you know, to remind themselves, like how was your cruise? How's your dog doing? You know, anything like that, or loves, you know, Prada bag, so let's talk about Prada or whatever it is, right?
Like just have something that can connect with them. But making those little connections with the patients and having those conversations other than dental makes the world a difference because it makes them feel like, oh, you're actually glad I'm here. And even just saying that to the patient, I'm so happy you're here.
Or I'll love to see you back to have that crown done. Like little comments like that make patients feel like, wow, they actually want me here. Like, they need me here.
And we've lost that, I think, in a lot of industries. We've lost that whole customer service of valuing who's actually giving you business. And there's so many interactions that I have, not in my practice, but other places I've gone where I feel like I'm an inconvenience to them.
And I'm like, but I'm paying you to do something, but I'm inconveniencing you. I don't understand that tactic, and I don't want to go back. So that seems to be a trend in a lot of places where we're in a world that we want things fast, we want it now, but we've lost the whole service aspect of like, let's treat our patients well, let's have a relationship with them, because they are worth it, right?
In my opinion, I think every one of our patients that walk through the door deserves a beautiful smile, a how are you, I'm so happy you're here, is how was your week? You got plans for the weekend. I love talking to patients.
I think it's fun. I like to learn about people and get to know them, and get to know what makes them tick. And I think that we really need to get back to that everywhere.
But really in dentistry, I think that's one way that you're going to see a huge growth.
Well, I love it, man. I think you talked about the kind of negative side of this a little bit, but I got one more question for you here. So you talked about the like, hey, just overly efficient, let's say not elegant, going back to our early part of the conversation, just like, hey, we got to get you in and out of here.
I feel like an inconvenience to you. And then I think you did mention a few things that you're even saying to patients to help them feel like they can trust you or whatever. But we're all patients, right?
So you mentioned being in those situations where you felt like an inconvenience. Tell us about the other side of that coin. When you felt most like, wow, I can trust this person, whatever, what are things that the care team does with you, dental, medical, whatever it is, to help you think, wow, I can really trust this healthcare provider?
So I think one of the biggest things is being listened to. So what I've learned in having experiences is having things repeated back to me that I've said to them, that sometimes I think that they're not listening. So when I hear what I have said, and it actually comes back to me, I just want to make sure I got this correct, it's huge because then I'm like, okay, you're taking the time to actually listen to what I'm saying.
You're not just writing down information or putting stuff in a chart, or filling out box one, two, three, and four, it's you're truly listening to what I'm saying, because the most annoying thing is to have to repeat yourself. Because if you're not listening, there's so many skills that we can have, but if you're not a good listener, you've lost me. It goes in your family, it can go in marriage, it can go in business, it can go pretty much with anything.
If you're not a good listener, you're going to have a very hard time being successful. But I think that that's where one of the biggest trust and best experience I've had is having somebody that's actively listening to what I'm saying, and then repeating it back to me, and then asking questions and extrapolating on that. They're like, oh, you told me about this, but can you tell me a little bit more?
How does that work? And show some interest in it. You can continue to keep that going.
I think that's the biggest one there for me.
I love that, man. I absolutely love that. What you just said, so from a motivational interviewing world, for those of everyone out listeners out there who are familiar with that world, we talk a lot about the value of reflective listening, and you just gave us the reflection question cadence of you reflect.
You're saying blank, tell me more. Help me understand that more. What does that mean for you in this way?
You reflect and then you ask the question. Sometimes if we just ask questions, asking good questions can be valuable, but if you're not actually doing the reflective listening piece, people will start to feel interrogated at a certain point of just like, well, you just keep asking me questions. Where's this going?
What garden path are you leading me down? Being able to reflectively listen is such a crucial part of that, and absolutely wholeheartedly yes to everything you just said. Which I found myself saying a lot today.
I imagine other listeners out there probably are finding themselves thinking the same thing and are like, dude, I want to talk to Zach. I know you were recently at a telecon speaking there, you're doing a lot of stuff. If people want to get in touch with you, if they want to find out more about you, satellite, tell us, hey, where would we go?
Help us understand how to connect with you and your work and things that are happening in your orbit.
Love it. So easiest direct way via email, Zach, Z-A-C-H at satellitefamilydentistry.com. And then also I run a dental office management Facebook group called Dental Office Manager Success Network, which is rapidly growing and absolutely loving being a part of that.
And I will be able to do that there on Facebook with you. Feel free to message me on there, put a post in, let's talk, and go from there.
Awesome, man. Well, I really appreciate you. Certainly, I wish I could have skated with you at some point, and certainly been in awe.
I'm definitely not that good, but I'm happy we got the chance to connect today, to learn more about you, to hear more of your story, and ultimately to hear where you're taking dentistry, which I'm super excited about in general. So look forward to continuing the conversation in person at a conference or wherever that might be. And for all the listeners out there, definitely give Zach an e-mail.
Make sure that you're getting in touch to hopefully do the things that I think we're all working and swimming in the same direction towards. So Zach, thanks so, so much for taking the time today. We really appreciate it.
Absolutely, thanks for having me, Matt.
