189: Mindset, Metrics, and Making Better Decisions in Your Dental Practice

What do you do when the schedule starts opening up, new patient numbers dip, or production isn’t where you expected it to be? The answer probably isn’t to panic, blame the market, or immediately throw more money at marketing.

In this episode, Dr. Jason is joined by Ryan Gross of CMO Share and Dr. Addison Killeen for an off-the-cuff conversation about navigating the inevitable ups and downs of dental practice ownership. They discuss how mindset can shape team performance, why practice owners need to understand their numbers before reacting to them, and how leading indicators like treatment presented, case acceptance, new patient conversion, and total appointments can reveal where the real problem lies.

The conversation also gets tactical, covering hygiene cancellations, ASAP lists, patient scheduling, financial conversations, case acceptance, and why owners need to spend more time observing and coaching their teams instead of getting buried in low-value tasks. Ryan and Addison also share their perspectives on cancellation fees, same-day scheduling, ghost columns, and preparing for historically slower months before they arrive.

If you’ve ever looked at a bad week or month and wondered whether you need to change everything, this episode is a reminder to get curious before getting reactive, look at the full picture, and focus your energy on the decisions that actually move the practice forward.