EPISODE 500: 500!!!!

Hey, chiropractors. We're ready for another Modern Chiropractic Mastery Show with Dr. Kevin Christie, where we discuss the latest in marketing strategies, contact marketing, direct response marketing, and business development with some of the leading experts in the industry.

Dr. Kevin Christie: [00:00:00] Welcome to episode 500. We're pulling up on our 10th year coming up in early 2027, but today is episode 500, and so we're gonna go over the 50 things I've learned in 500 episodes. There's probably more than 50, but I sat down and, and really reviewed the guests and the different topics we covered over the last 500 episodes, or I guess 499 episodes, and I wanted to jot down some of the things that I have learned.

Before we dive into that, uh, we are getting close, one more month until the early bird, uh, discount ends for the Thrive event, which is January 30th and 31st, 2027. This is again hosted by MPI, FTCA and, and MCM, the trifecta there of groups that we're putting this event on. We've got Mark King, Bobby Mabee, myself, Lindsay Muma, Brett Winchester, Holly Tucker, Brandon Steele, all [00:01:00] speaking and giving you actionable items to, to leave with.

It's not gonna be, uh, just random topics. It's gonna be coordinated, and you're gonna have a workbook, and you're gonna work through things and apply it. Kurt Kibbenberger is gonna be our MC. We're gonna have a good time. We're gonna learn a ton, and you'll be able to, uh, connect with the other guests and, and also the sponsors and obviously the speakers.

So we'd love for you to check that out and register before the early bird. That's, uh, bit.ly, B-I-T.L-Y/thrive2027. So check that out. We'd love to see you there. We already got a bunch of people registered, so the event is happening, and we hope to see you there. So all right, let's, let's dive in. Um, I wanna start out just with a little bit of the history You know, of the podcast.

Um, some of you may know, some of you are newer listeners, so I'm just gonna kinda go from the beginning, right? Um, I think it was July of 2016, uh, started the closed Facebook group, which has now [00:02:00] been branded Modern Chiropractic Mastery. You can check that out. We have almost 5,000 members in there, and it's been strong for, for 10 years now.

And so we did that, and then it was April of the next year , decided to launch the podcast of the same name and just went at it. But prior to that, I actually had started podcasting, um, you know, back in, like, early 2016. I had a podcast called The Modern Desk Jockey, and we did about 80-something episodes around health and wellness for the desk worker.

And that was how I got my podcasting start. So I was doing that, uh, doing a lot of marketing and stuff and growth for my practice and realized that, you know, it was working. And that's when we started the Facebook group to help just put free information on there for chiropractors around marketing, essentially, started out with.

And then now, you know, we've evolved to all things practice growth now. But, uh, the Facebook group really took off. The... It seemed like a lot of [00:03:00] people wanted the information, and I felt like The Modern Desk Jockey podcast had kinda run its course and it-- but I didn't wanna stop podcasting, and I felt like I had more to say, um, for the profession and on, around marketing and business growth, and that's, that was really how it started.

And, um, didn't do anything with it, didn't monetize it for a couple years. But what the podcast ultimately did was provide free information for people, and it, you know, obviously it built an audience. And from there, I, I kinda just listened to what the audience was, was wanting And, and it would have been July of 2018, so two years, uh, two years since I started the Facebook group, about a year and a half since starting the podcast.

Uh, Bobby Maybe and I of FTCA decide... We both had similar ideas around, uh, what is now the Chiropractic Success Academy, and we launched that very successfully in July [00:04:00] of 2018, and definitely people wanted what we were offering there. And CSA still exists, uh, to this day, and it's been great for a lot of people, and it started from the audience that Bobby had.

Uh, he had, he had built over a few years prior to that, and obviously the audience that I had built in a couple years as well, and it just really took off. And then from there, MCM as a company really started in April of 2019, where we, we, we took on, I think, 10 clients for coaching. And really the story around that was my now wife, we were engaged and, but we were actually doing a cross-state long distance, just a few hours away, seeing each other often enough.

But we wanted to get her over, and her career wasn't going to, uh, transfer over to here. Uh, we wanted to get married, we wanted to start a family. And so I essentially a- [00:05:00] you know, took out the dinner and said, "What do you think if I try to launch coaching and try to replace your income and you move on over?"

She thought it was a fine idea, gave me the support, gave me my, um, kind of confidence I needed in it, and I did it. And fortunately enough, when I promoted to get 10 clients, I got 10 clients and effectively replaced her income and, and here we are. Uh, now MCM is quite a big coaching practice and bigger than my chiropractic practice, and it's spawned a lot of different things, um, from, again, from the podcast.

And I think the, the third thing I want to say the podcast has provided oth- other than inf- you know, knowledge and information I've learned by having a podcast, which I'll talk about in a minute, is some friends. I've, I've got quite a bit, bit of friends in the profession now that I met originally from the podcast Or the podcast spawned, uh, you know, maybe, uh, the [00:06:00] mastermind, and I've got friends within the mastermind now and stuff like that, and it's just been pretty cool what the podcast has done, um, for me professionally and, and frankly, personally.

But let's, let's dive in here in a second. Um, I... Before I do go into the top 50 here, I do wanna make mention that, um, you know, I-- the podcast, a lot of people ask, like, "How do you do a lot of the work?" and all that. And I was like, "We're honestly..." Like, my, my role in the podcast has really always been getting the guests, doing the interview, and, and that's really been, been what I do.

I've always tried to have someone on the production side, and that started early on. I mean, I-- There was, uh, John Lee Dumas. He, uh, he's a big podcaster. He's been a guest on my show, and he had a whole thing called Podcasters Paradise, which is what I signed up for, and that's how I got kinda going. And through that, I met a guy named Steve Stewart, who first produced the show and really helped me [00:07:00] with, like, what I needed as far as equipment and, and that type of stuff.

And he was with me for a f- fair amount, and then... I met a guy in Strategic Coach who had the Podcast Factory, and I signed on with them. It was a little more expensive. It was quite a bit expensive in the... each month, but they did a lot, like rebranded. They helped with organization of the podcast and new audios, and, like, they really did more than just produce it at the time.

Kinda coached me as well and was doing that. But it was expensive every month, and it was around COVID when everything was uncertain. I was looking at ways to save some money, and, uh, I was like, "That, that's gonna be..." I think that was, like, $1,200 a month at the time, which was a lot. And, um, Becky, who was, was with me, and she's, um, still with us in MCM, a big part of what we do, obviously.

And I had asked if, if she, if she could maybe produce the podcast, and she took it on. And, uh, so I guess we're six, six years [00:08:00] now with Becky doing all the production side, so I wanna thank her. I can't do this without her, for sure, and she, uh, does a lot for the podcast and, uh, really makes it happen. And I just...

i'm able to get , the guests. I'm able to come up with the topics. I'm able to hit record and send it to her, and then the rest is magic. And you'd be surprised, uh, how many things can go awry with all the different podcast platforms we're on, and things they change, and stuff we have to figure out.

It's, it's not for the faint of heart, so thank you, Becky. I couldn't do this without you.

All right, let's dive into the top 50. I'm gonna go through kinda quick, so it's not gonna be, you know, belabored here, three-hour podcast. But sometimes I'll, I'll probably elaborate a little bit more on it. Uh, sometimes I'll mention Person's name, um, and, and sometimes I won't 'cause I won't remember it. Uh, so number one is I don't feel like I know [00:09:00] everything, and I don't pretend to know everything.

And I remember saying that to a podcast guest, and he, uh, his name was Jeff, and I, uh, frankly forget what his last name was. It was quite a long time ago, and I didn't research what it was. I just remember it was Jeff. And he said, "Oh, you're just a resource dealer. That is a, a great thing to be." And I was like, "Yeah, that is what I am."

Right? I kinda collect and catalog resources that I get from guests and other aspects of, um, being absorbed into all things practice growth, and, and then I deal out those resources to other people when they, when they need 'em. And so I liked that framing of it 'cause sometimes you get imposter syndrome where it's like, well, I don't know everything, and I haven't experienced everything, and it'd be foolish to think I knew everything.

Um, but I do have a lot of resources, whether it's information I learned or people I know, and so I, uh, f- I do like that label as a resource dealer. Number two was the phrase, [00:10:00] "Even better." That was by Joel Weldon, probably at one of my first five interviews on the podcast. It's episode two, three, four, or five or something like that.

And he's a hall of fame public speaker, pretty well-known in that world, and he has the phrase, "Even better," which is, uh, more appropriate than just saying better, right? So if, um, you're trying to... If, if you, if you're talking to a patient and you want them to get better at whatever, you say, "Even better." Or if s- you're saying something like, "Oh, you're, you know, you're gonna do this, and you're gonna become a better public speaker," it would be more like, "Oh, you're gonna do this, and you're gonna become an even better public speaker."

So I really like that. I try to use that word even before better often, and it's been helpful. Um, is, um, something that has helped me out with patient care as well. Or when I'm coaching someone, it's like, "You know, you're [00:11:00] really good at this. We're gonna make you even better." Uh, number three, content marketing is a long game.

Consistency beats virality. I think that's something I wish I could tattoo on people's, uh, forehead when they look in the mirror is content marketing is a long game, and you need to be consistent. I mean, frankly, that's what this podcast has been, content and a form of content marketing, and it's been a long game and done consistently.

Uh, you know, I haven't missed an... It's a weekly episode, as you know. Thursdays comes out. I haven't missed an episode in the 500 episodes. In the-- So the almost 10 years, I have not missed a week, so I've been very consistent, and it has served me well. So what can you do in your community to be more consistent in your content to drive your business?

Number four, service and hospitality are different, and patients remember hospitality. Okay? Service and hospitality are different, and patients remember hospitality. Number five, [00:12:00] clinicians can be great at business Many of you are really great clinicians, and there's a lot of people that have a misconception that you can't be good at business and be a doctor at the same time.

I'm here to tell you, you can be, and I would, uh, hope everybody gets rid of that. So I want you to be really good clinically, but I want you to be really good at business. And this leads to number six, which I got from Jay Gier of the Scheduling Institute, is business and healthcare is just providing the absolutely best patient experience.

If you do everything to provide the best patient experience, then the rest will take care of itself. Okay? And that's providing great clinical, great team, great space, great, uh, education. I mean, just provide a great experience for the patient, and that is really good business in healthcare. Number seven, one of my favorites, eighty-five percent PBS and fifteen percent [00:13:00] QVC.

Kim Walsh-Phillips on my podcast, uh, basically saying is your, is your content should be eighty-five percent PBS, like free information, and fifteen percent QVC, like selling and promoting. You get those percentages off too much, people will tune out. Okay? Number eight, sales isn't a dirty word when it serves the patient.

You know, too many people, and it's the only thing I'm gonna kinda say on the sales thing is you hold... you withhold recommendations because you're putting yourself in the buying decision for that person, and you got a little bit of a money issue there in your mind, and so that you don't sell them what they want, and you think sales is, is a bad thing.

Number nine, there are four phases of having an A team. People always wonder why they don't have a great team around them, and there's usually one or many things off of the four. First is you need to have a [00:14:00] really good talent acquisition plan. Two is you need to have a really good hiring process. Three, you need to have a really good onboarding process.

And four, you need to have continuing development of that team. And if you don't, then you're gonna start having B and C players, and they're gonna infect your A players, and those A players are gonna become B and C players. I see oftentimes one of those four is faulty, and it leads to a, a poor team.

Number ten, hire for attitude, train for skill. Number eleven, practice finances. I'm just gonna say practice finances. I have, I have interviewed everybody under the sun, I feel like, on financials. Everything from practice finances to personal finances to retirement to KPIs, you, you name it And, um, we've even had a recent batch of financial people on here again, because I, I don't know if it's subconsciously, like I've always wanted to [00:15:00] get better at that.

I feel like finally after 10 years of it, um, I've got a pretty good grasp of it. Now, the thing that's always the wild card in the situation is the person's psychology around money, and so you can have all of the... You could understand all of the principles, but there's still the human involved in it, and that's something that, uh, I still wrestle with, uh, for myself and for other, for coaching clients we have.

But I feel like myself and MCM as a company really understands how to get chiropractors to understand their practice finances. Number 12, "Becoming elite is a daily standard, not a moment." That was Ben Stephens not that long ago. Like that I like that. Number 13, life goals should drive business goals, not the reverse, right?

So, uh, I recently will have Lindsay Mumma on, and [00:16:00] we talked about that. Again, I learned that originally, uh, from her in Santa Fe. We talk about it on the podcast. I put it on here 'cause I knew I had her coming up again, and I was looking through and I was like, "Oh, yeah." You know, your vision of your life, and she's gonna talk about personal core values and then how you align your business around those, uh, versus the other way around.

Number 14, position yourself as a community leader, not just a provider. I feel like as a chiropractor, the more you can consider yourself as a leading educator in the community and not just a doctor, the better you will be for that. Number 15, your website is your 24/7 front desk, so it should convert, not just look nice, okay?

Like, your website needs to be a lot more than an online business, uh, card. It needs to really help when people get to your website at whatever time they feel compelled that this is the right place for me to schedule. [00:17:00] And you should have online scheduling on there, which is part of what makes it a front desk.

Number 16, reactivating old patients is cheaper than finding new ones. Everybody harps on new patients, and yes, new patients are important, but not enough chiropractors have strategic reactivation marketing being done. That's one of our bread and butters at MCM. So number 16 is reactivating old patients is cheaper than finding new ones.

Number 17, I'm just gonna say Building a StoryBrand by Donald Miller. If you haven't read that book, read it. Uh, he was kind enough to let me write some stuff in my book about it, and it's just if you really wanna understand story and messaging, uh, you gotta read that. So Buil- Building a StoryBrand by Donald Miller.

18, patients remember how you made them feel more than what technique you used. That's almost kinda going back to the hospitality one, but yeah, patients remember how you made them feel more than what technique you used. Number 19, I'm gonna elaborate on this one a little bit. [00:18:00] It's one of my favorite things And it's the salt shaker theory of leadership.

Danny Meyer, the book "Setting the Table." Um, I didn't have him on my podcast, but I read the book, got this, I talked about it on the podcast. Uh, I talk about it often with our clients and, and I just love it. But basically, really quick, he, uh, years ago, you know, has a very successful restaurant in Manhattan.

He's, he's the brains behind Shake Shack, and he was having a meeting with his business coach at the time, and they were at a table in his restaurant when they were closed, and there was a salt and pepper shaker in there, and, and Danny Meyer's complaining about his team and his staff and, like, they don't listen, and they-- they-- he's got this vision, but they always kinda are doing what they wanna do, and he always has to correct them.

And the coach took the salt shaker and moved it away out of the center of the table, and he's like, "Where do you want that salt shaker?" Danny Meyer moves it back to the center where it was. He moves it again. And, and then Danny Meyer's like, "Okay, what is this about?" And he's like, "This [00:19:00] is like your staff, right?

The s- your team is going to stray from the center." And he called it, like, the law of entropy. And, like, they're gonna stray from the center, and that's just natural, and you can't expect them to be centered around your vision without you applying constant gentle pressure. So the real key here is what the salt shaker theory of leadership is, is you have to apply constant gentle pressure to your team to keep them centered on the vision of the company and the practice.

And if you're not willing to do that, they are gonna stray away, and sometimes they're gonna stray too far. So you gotta keep them centered, and you do have to apply constant but gentle pressure around them and make sure they stay centered. So that is number nineteen, the salt shaker theory of leadership.

Number twenty, your culture is whatever you tolerate. Your culture is whatever you tolerate. Twenty-one, profit is a decision you [00:20:00] make, not something left over at the end. And I got that from Holly Tucker and a lot of her work from, um, Profit First. So if you ever wanna know Profit First stuff, Michael Michalowicz is the author of the book.

Holly knows it inside and out. She's been kind enough to be on our podcast, to speak at our West Mastermind. She's speaking at our East Mastermind at 2027. Um, definitely one of my, uh, resources on all things Profit First and, and other money-related things. Number 22, some of the best practices are in-network, but ethically offer add-on services.

Um, and I'm out of network, and I made that decision some years ago. But we've coached, and we have a lot of clients, and we have a lot of members in our mastermind who are in-network with insurances but have gotten good at offering, uh, ethically offering add-on services that are gonna help with the outcomes.

Okay? Gonna help with the outcomes [00:21:00] Number 23, build a practice that someone would actually buy. That's my goal for chiropractors. I think one of the things that we do well with our coaching is that you just get immersed into business and practice growth, and you start building systems, and you ultimately are building something that you could sell.

So number 23, build a practice that someone would actually buy. 24, your health is the practice's most important asset. Your health, both physically and mentally, is the practice's most important asset. 25, on that point, burnout is oftentimes a chronic cash flow issue. Take two chiropractors, all things being equal, one's got cash confidence, the other one's got cash flow struggles chronically.

One of those you can guess has a higher propensity to burning out Number 26, too many chiropractors are busy and broke or [00:22:00] busy and broken. We gotta get away from that Number 27, money invested in something that doesn't work out is just R&D costs. Dan Sullivan of Strategic Coach, I love that. I love investing money in my businesses and tinkering and figuring out what works or not, and if I lose money on it, I chalk it up to R&D costs.

We're researching and developing what works for our practice. Twenty-eight, system one versus system two thinking. Um, so Danny Kahneman, Thinking Slow and Fast, or Fast and Slow, one of the two. It's a hard read, but the s- the, the, the just real key take-home there is system one thinking is, you know, easy, automatic thinking, like two plus two, whereas system two thinking is where you gotta turn on that frontal cortex and really grind through what it is.

And as examples like, you know, when you have a, you know, when you have patients, most of them throughout a day when you've been practicing for 20 years, it's just system one thinking. But then every so often you get those complicated cases, and you gotta [00:23:00] turn your thinking cap on, that's system two thinking.

And the way I try to talk to young DCs about this is that early on in your career, everything's challenging. All cases are challenging. And so you're just grinding through system two thinking all day, and, and you... and it's hard, and you're-- and, and you take it home with you, and it's, you're like, "Am I gonna be able to do this for thirty, forty years?"

But it's just that you're grinding through system two thinking, whereas someone that's been practicing for a while, you know, eighty-five percent of their patients a day is just system one thinking, no sweat, and then you got a handful that are, you gotta think through. So it gets better. You just gotta keep on getting better and don't give up and just start to recognize, "Okay, I'm just, I'm in system one here.

I'm, I'm four years into this, three years into this, two years into this, into this. It's gonna get better." Number twenty-nine, which takes me to, uh, clinically confident at forty-five. That was Mark King on the podcast. He- I had asked him a question about, we [00:24:00] had talked about a lot of things, but asked him, like, when he felt like, you know, you really were rolling in confidence as far as clinical.

Not that you're always perfect, but you just felt really good about the situation. He said forty-five, and I, I remember that thinking like, "Wow, that's, that's awesome to hear," because some people expect it at thirty, and that's just not gonna happen. Number thirty, treating for only pain and not function is, uh, typically a problem, and that's Brett Winchester.

Um, he talked a lot about function, and we talked about how ironically a lot of evidence-based chiropractors will harp on function. They'll talk about movement. They'll talk about don't chase the pain. But then they use pain as the line of demarcation for discharge on that versus, say, function. And Brett is really good at that.

Thirty-one, you can be a driven entrepreneur and have inner peace. Gina Wickman was on my podcast, probably [00:25:00] maybe one of the biggest guests I had in the 500 episodes, and he, you know, from EOS, he was on, and he wrote a book called "Shine." And actually, as I record this, next week, his co-author, um, is gonna be at our East-West Mastermind in Dallas, um, and that's gonna be awesome.

He's gonna talk about the, uh, principles from "Shine," and that's Rob Dube, and, and really how you can be driven and have inner peace. Um, a-and I do believe in that. 32, how hard Greg Rose worked to build his practice. Uh, many of you know Greg Rose from TPI or SFMA. He was on the podcast, and I-- he-- go search. I don't know what episode that is.

Go search if you haven't listened to it. It was a few years ago. M-man, he worked hard. I think a lot of times we have this misconception that some people are just geniuses and it just fell in their lap. Guy is definitely a genius, but man, he worked hard. So I was-- I left that in-interview just really, "Wow, I didn't realize how hard he [00:26:00] worked to build up his reputation."

Number 33, how so many of us make the buying decision for the patient. I kinda talked about it earlier, but man, it's, it's just, it's a chronic problem where we put ourselves in the buying decision for the patient, and we withhold care. And what my, my kinda antidote to that as far as thinking through is, is the idea of, like, if your mom came in with something, you would just do exactly what she needs and give her exactly what she needs 'cause there's no money decision in that process.

It's your mom. She's not paying you, obviously. And you would do that. But then the patient comes in, because there's money involved, you kinda half-ass it, or you withhold what they need or how many visits they need. Like, all these different things, you get in the way of the buying decision, so I'd love for you to stop doing that.

34, never lose a patient again, or, um, as h-his book is, "Never Lose a Customer Again," that's Joey Coleman. But he was on my podcast, [00:27:00] and we talked about never lose a patient again. Just really liked that episode, really liked that book. It's, it's revamped how, in our practice and how, what we coach our client.

We're, we're h-- In 2026, I did a lot around the patient experience. I did episodes, I did, uh, I w- I did a, actually a master class with Chris Chippendale in London this summer on the, on the, um, patient experience. And so much of what we've done with the patient experience centers around Joey Coleman's work.

I got to see him speak at Jay Greenstein's event, which leads me to number 35, something I learned from Jay, which was the net promoter score from Jay Greenstein, the net promoter score. ChiroUp does a really good job of the net promoter score. I'll let you AI search it if you want to, but, um, ChiroUp measures the net promoter score.

The silent killer of a practice is when you're not getting enough of your patients promoting you Number 36, you need to become world-class at referring to other great providers You need to become [00:28:00] world-class at referring to other great providers. Thirty-seven, make sure you have redundancies in your practice, right?

If the front desk does certain things and the front desk is out on maternity leave, you need some redundancy. Or they put their two weeks notice in, or your CA, or it's like try to look at all the things that people in your practice do and what's your backup plan if they're not there or they leave. So make sure you have redundancies.

Number 38, comparison is the thief of joy. I forget who said that originally, but comparison is the thief of joy. Number 39, you can struggle for years and then exponentially grow. Brock Martin. Uh, looked that one up, one of my favorite episodes. On our website, Modern Chiropractic Mastery, on the podcast tab, I actually have a 12, uh, episode starter pack, 'cause a lot of people get to the show late, and, uh, I pi- cherry-pick 12 that I really think people need to start with.

And he's on there, [00:29:00] and it's just a really good interview of someone that was, um, struggle- uh, you know, like just kinda spinning his wheels for a while. He admits it on there, talks about it, and then now his practice has boomed huge. He's actually even a state senator for the state of Tennessee now, and it runs, uh, his wife's a chiropractor, and they've got associates.

Like, it's just amazing how many years they were kinda spinning their wheels, and then how they exponentially grew once they got their mind right on some things. Number 40, all things SEO with Darcy Sullivan. SEO has been huge for our practice, huge for many practices. She's been our resident SEO specialist.

She's been on the show quite a bit. She's obviously a sponsor of the podcast. She's just someone I've relied on. She's actually locally here. I've used her for my practice prior to even starting MCM. So we've had probably a 15-year, uh, working relationship now, and it's been great. So all things SEO, Darcy Sullivan.

Number 41, the power of office design, Carolyn Bolt. She's been our kind of resident expert on that. She's [00:30:00] been on a few times. Come up- coming up again actually in a couple weeks, but just how powerful really good office design is, it really is amazing. And she's with Crossfields, uh, Design, so check that out.

Uh, 42, becoming the CEO of your practice, Ray Tuck, the late Ray Tuck. What a, what a great man he was, great chiropractor, great person, great everything, uh, really understood business. Uh, had him on my podcast. I was able to have him come speak, uh, to our mastermind group and really got the i- got, really got, got it of what it meant to be the CEO of your practice when I learned from, from Ray.

Forty-three, traveling with points. I gotta give credit to Eli Faccenda on this. He was introduced to me by Jay Greenstein, had him on the podcast. I used his company for a while, and then I've learned a lot Uh, from Vanessa Wilczak from our, uh, mastermind group. She knows everything about points, and [00:31:00] she's helped our mastermind a lot.

That's what's been great about the mastermind, both groups. We've got so many great chiropractors in there, but great people that have other things that they share that are not just chiropractic related, and it's helped all of our lives out. I, I can't speak enough about our mastermind members. It's just awesome.

And I'm excited that we've filled our 2027 both groups, which I, I wasn't sure was gonna happen as far as like when we started the second group a few years ago. But it's, uh, both groups are just awesome, and sometimes things come out of it that are not practice related. Forty-four, what it actually takes to become an industry transformer.

Again, that's gonna be, um, certain people that we've had on and being an ind- like just really escaping just the profession, whether it's Brett Winchester, Greg Rose, like certain people like that. It's just been impressive to see that. It's just been really impressive to see that. [00:32:00] Um, number forty-five, "The Great Game of Business" by John Williams.

"The Great Game of Business" by John Williams. Um, he, he came and spoke to our mastermind group as well, and we've really dove into that information, which leads me to number forty-six. So the gr- actually, maybe before I go to forty-six, forty-five, "The Great Game of Business" is a book. It's also a company that coaches on things business-wise.

It's really good, good story. Jack Stack is the author of the book. John Williams was on my podcast, spoke to our group. That leads to forty-six is the critical number. So "The Great Game of Business" really hones in on the critical number, which is, uh, it's a weak link in your business. It's a measuring, uh, it, it's like a measuring yardstick.

It's performance-based, something you can rally around. And the critical number we really honed in in our coaching groups and got people to understand what their critical number is and attack that, and that's [00:33:00] been awesome Number 47 This one's always dicey. Um, but I think it's just so important, and it's the idea of resilience, and I do think we have a resilience problem in our society.

I think we have a resilience problem in our profession, and I know everybody's wired differently, and I, I'm not gonna generalize, and I'm not gonna get on a soapbox or anything. But Amy Buxbaum was on. She's a local, um, in, in our area. She's, um, a psychiatrist, trained, and also is an endurance athlete, and she coaches endurance athletes.

I- we-- her and I did a workshop together to our local community, and then I had her podcast because she has such a good breakdown of what resilience is, and, you know, she applies a lot of it to her endurance athletes 'cause most... Like, you run these ultra-marathons, it's just mental [00:34:00] resilience. Um, it obviously is physical, we get that, but the, the mental side is impressive.

And then we applied it to business and things like that in our podcast, and how she divines res- defines resilience is adaptability plus flexibility plus learning. And, um, it's really, really true, right? You gotta be flexible. Things are gonna go wrong. You gotta be able to adapt, and you gotta be able to learn from it and, and change course sometimes.

So if you can become adaptable and flexible and learn, you can become resilient, right? When the insurance starts paying like shit in your state, you need to be able to adapt to that, learn from it, and be flexible around your thoughts on what you're gonna do with your practice, and you'll become resilient around that.

I can name a hundred things in chiropractic that we need to be resilient around. Um, so it's adaptability plus flexibility plus learning. Number forty-eight [00:35:00] Some chiropractors and programs are money-driven. You should be and can be outcomes-driven, and then that drives the money. This is the order of ethical patient care and what MCM strives for.

So everything we do needs to be outcomes-driven. It's just gotta be outcomes-driven. Y- y- you know, and, and when you get patient... You know, we talk a lot about patient adherence, right? And that's always a problem, and this and that. And I always say it's like, why is patient adherence important? And you get all these answers, but patient adherence is important because if they don't adhere to the, the, you know, to the ethical treatment plan you're giving them, they're not gonna get the results.

The outcomes aren't gonna be there. And so you gotta do things to get them to adhere to the treatment plan. You gotta get good at that so you get better outcomes. You can't be discharging them early or providing a bad experience and they're sloughing off before they get their outcomes. So I'm just gonna read number [00:36:00] 48 again, because a lot of chiropractors and programs, coaching programs are money-driven, and that's the first thing, and then everything else follows.

But you should be and can be outcomes-driven and still have money. Number 49, 10% to 12% of your revenue spent on marketing. That's a recent episode from Greg Crabtree. Not enough of you are spending money on marketing, and good marketing, obviously. We just don't wanna waste money. And then I get a lot of people say, "Oh, well, I just go referral-based practice," and all that's fine, right?

I don't spend money on money, I g- on marketing, I have referral-based practice, and all that's fine. But it doesn't work when you try to hire an associate or you wanna grow to a certain size. Like, it, it does, it does not necessarily work, okay? And you gotta understand that, and you gotta make sure you're spending money on good marketing, on good marketing, okay?[00:37:00]

All right, number 50, um, first principles thinking. A lot of people will hear this about, like, Elon Musk, 'cause he's just, like, a genius when it comes to first principles thinking, right? An example of that is, like, the rock- you know, space, and getting to space, and the reason why it was always kind of government funded 'cause it was so expensive, and it never was privatized.

And so he knew he had to figure out how to do it, and you gotta just keep on drilling down to the, the, the truths of the matter. And for the space travel, the rockets were too expensive, and then they were too expensive, and then they... You use them once, and they were... You know, they broke apart into the ocean.

And so you had to use a different rocket every time. And so he knew he had to find, A, a cheaper way to build rockets, which he's done, and then B, he had to be able to reuse them, and that's why he spent so many years now trying to catch these rockets. And you see what he's done with it. It's pretty impressive.

Like, that was a fir- that was a first principles thinking. It was like, "I gotta be able to [00:38:00] reuse these rockets. Otherwise, we're not gonna be able to, uh, get people to space en masse in the future." Right? And so what f- first principles thinking is, is you have to break a problem down to the truths you can't argue with, then big- build back up from there, right?

So step one is you gotta strip away assumptions, what we believe because everyone in the profession does it. Number two is you need to find the bedrock, the truths that can't be broken down any further. And then number three is you rebuild from there. Decide what to do based on what's true, not what's trending, okay?

And that's first principles thinking. We're tackling that a lot with our clients. It's kind of between A couple different top, few principles, everything, but around this is really where we're putting a lot of our energy into our clients is around first principles thinking and finding the bedrock. But the one thing I keep on telling people is the bedrock has to be above the ethical zone [00:39:00] line, right?

Like too many coaching programs, too many chiropractors, they go all the way down below ethics and, and they do things to make money that's not ethical. And so the truths and finding the bedrock of the truths has to be above that zone where we're not messing around with the ethics of things, okay? So first principle thinking, str- strip away assumptions, find the bedrock, and rebuild from there.

So that is 50 things in 500 episodes. I hope you got a few things out of that. I hope you've been a listener. If you are a listener, I'd just appreciate if you would share it with a few colleagues. I mean, I get people reaching out to me all the time that they like listening to the show. They're glad their buddy sent it to them.

Just send it to a few people. Uh, we're, we got a ton of downloads every month and it's growing and, and I've got more topics to talk about. I got more ideas. I hope we have a 1,000th episode, I guess in 10 years. Um, but, uh, that is my 50 in [00:40:00] 500. I hope you learned a couple things like I have over the 10 years, and I'll continue doing it.