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Org or email them partnerships at. Thank you life. Org thank you life healing through accessibility. Joe Sanok 00:01:16 This is the practice of the practice podcast with Joe Sana. Joe Sanok 00:01:19 Session number 1038. Ashley Mielke 00:01:27 So one of the first major steps I took was looking at, okay, I’m not only seeing about 20 clients a week, I’m also supporting the administrative team. And I was the clinical supervisor for our clinical interns at that time. So I was doing everything and feeling really overwhelmed. So that first logical step for me that really, started that process was hiring a clinical director. So I looked at the team that I had, and I selected an individual who was very experienced, who had a supervision background, was very passionate about the ethics of being a psychologist. So she was just honestly the perfect fit. So I approached her with this opportunity, not knowing what that role would look like. Be really transparent about. I have no idea what I’m doing. Here’s what I’ve been doing. Can we put our heads together and create a position? And so we took that senior psychologist. We rolled her into a leadership role as our as a clinical director, and she took over the supervision tasks. Ashley Mielke 00:02:30 And then I went to hire a second clinical director that focused on child, the child needs within our business and really growing that part of the company. And then I eventually hired a, director of people and culture to support me in supporting the team. And then we did have a director of operations as well, which we have now since let go of the company from the company. It was just a need that we didn’t require any further at this point. So right now we are a leadership team of four. And as the CEO over the last 18 months, I was able to step away from client work and truly have nothing but time freedom. So I run two meetings a month with our leadership team and our administrative team, and I run our payroll. That’s it. Everything else is just that bonus connection time with my team. So I don’t go into the offices anymore. I will go in intentionally. We’ll have lunch. I’ll bring coffee. you know, if they need something, whatever. I’ll stop in. Ashley Mielke 00:03:29 I have a new baby. I have a seven year old and a four month old. So I’ll bring the baby in. We’ll go for a little visit. But really, what I’ve created is a position where I have ultimate freedom. So coming back from my maternity leave, I’m just working one day a week. I thought, you know what a really miss the client work. So I’ve actually just taken on a couple of clients for clients. So it’s really nice now that I’m able to choose to sit with clients again just online as a way to stay connected to the work. So what I’m going to share with you is basically the reverse engineer journey that I started about four years ago. So I’m going to share my screen and we’re going to save questions just till the end of the presentation. So I’m just going to make sure this is the full screen. Hopefully everyone can see this okay. So I’ve shared a little of my journey. My question for you, if you are considering what that transition would look like, is, what is your reason for wanting to transition out of the day to day? Maybe, like me, you have a really strong desire to continue to grow your business. Ashley Mielke 00:04:31 You want to focus on growth and vision and strategy and get out of the weeds of doing everything. Maybe you’re just feeling really burnt out and you want to create more, more freedom and time for your family or extracurricular. Or maybe you want to pursue other passions in your career, which is also okay to do a gift for me through this journey was being able to start with the pop team. I’ve now been with pop for two years, just over two years, which is really hard to believe. The time has really flown by, so I’ve had an opportunity now to be a consultant for other therapists, which has been a really great joy of my life. So get really clear on your why. So I wanted to be really succinct in some of the big steps to consider in making this transition both responsibly and ethically. One of the first things you want to think about is, okay, if I start to transition out of seeing clients, what is the net profit that I will have to replace if I’m not generating that revenue? So I say net profit because you want to look at what are you paying yourself? Are you paying yourself the same kind of percentage as your clinicians? Are you paying yourself? just like dividends a month. Ashley Mielke 00:05:42 Like what does that actually translate to? So that when you do have someone move in to replacing those hours, you will know how many hours will have to be replaced, which is basically the second step here. How are you going to make up for those lost hours? And when you make that transition, are you going to do it all at once? Let’s say, for example, you decide, okay, six months from now I’m going to go from seeing my 20 clients right now, a week a two 0 in 6 months. How are you going to make that transition financially? Or you could do like how I did it and I staggered that transition. So I dropped a day. I started by dropping a day and I think I was doing four days a week. So I went down to three days a week over a say, 60 day or three month period because I wanted to ethically. And it’s on the next slide, ensure that my client care was was a priority. So, taking care of my clients, reducing that one day, and then I was just. Ashley Mielke 00:06:38 Okay, how does this feel getting other therapists to increase their hours? So the second step here, okay, letting the team know, here’s an opportunity and always go to the team you have first. Hey guys. We’re looking to fulfill 12 more hours a week or six more hours a week I want to give you that opportunity first. If they say, great, I would love to do that. Awesome. That’s less work for you in terms of hiring and onboarding and training. If they if your team says nope, we’re good, then you want to look at hiring. What that what’s that going to look like? If you’re planning on transitioning from four days to zero days, if you can hire someone to stagger that time with you at the exact same time, That would be ideal. So maybe you say to a new contractor, okay, I can offer you one day to start, and then we want to introduce a second day and a third day and a fourth day, say over the next 12 months, just be transparent about that process. Ashley Mielke 00:07:34 So get really clear on how you want to make that transition. So I did it very slowly until about 18 months ago. Like I said, I was only down to one day a week. So that was an easy transition for me to let go of that final day. And the business continued to operate like it had been. The next point is who is going to fulfill that role as clinic director or supervisor? So most of us are doing all of those things when we’re starting our group practice, and that’s great. And maybe you love that so much you actually want to maintain that. That’s great if you want to. So make sure you include that in your growth plan if you want to maintain that supervisor status. If not, the again, you want to look at, can you promote internally? Are you going to have to hire externally for this position? What would that look like? What are those tasks? So one step that I took before hiring our first clinical director is I wrote out a whole bucket list. Ashley Mielke 00:08:32 That’s a we call it. So bucket list is every single task under the sun that you do in your role. Once I did that, I printed it out, and I highlighted every task that would fall under the role of a clinical supervisor and director. And there I had it. There was my tasks and duties for that position. So that’s how we started out. Very simple process. And then the position just evolved and shifted as time went on. But that’s a great place to start in terms of looking at what you would be delegating, delegating for those for that position. The next step is who will manage the day to day operations. Do you have an administrative person working full time? Again, a lot of us in early group practice we are doing all the admin. I did all the admin. I think up until year four, which is like crazy when I think about it now. Right? I think we were a team of four and I was still doing all the emails, all the bookings, all the phone calls. Ashley Mielke 00:09:31 we were doing individual billing. We were not doing insurance billing at the time. So it was just like cash pay. But we’re in Canada, so it’s a little bit different here. It’s not as complicated of a process. So it was year four, when we hired our full time admin. But if you’re looking to to get out of the day to day, you probably already have an admin who’s doing those day to day. You may already have a biller, so these are things that you need to get in place, systems you need to get in place before you step out. Also, do you have a bookkeeper? Do you have someone who’s doing your reconciliation every month that’s providing you your PNL statements so you can look at your profit and loss. You can continually monitor your numbers. What about an accountant and are you incorporated? Again, it all depends on province, state, country, what the kind of regulations are. So these are important systems to have in place. And even something as simple as who’s going to clean your office? I cleaned my office for like six years actually my husband did. Ashley Mielke 00:10:31 I’m like, you go, you clean. That was just what he did. and, that was his his labor of love for for the business until we were just too busy as a family. So we now have cleaners that professional cleaners that clean, and we get our administrative team to manage the office supplies. So it’s these small things that can eat up a lot of your time. If you don’t have systems in place, The next thing is, I had mentioned a little bit earlier, is you want to create your client list, get an Excel spreadsheet, go old school, right? Maybe you have a client report in your EHR or your practice management system and then determine their treatment plan. Okay, where are they at in their treatment? What’s the phase? Are they. Would this be someone that I would refer internally? Because you know what they actually do need a lot of support. Will they remain on my caseload or are they ready to terminate? Okay. So that’s important. as you start to transition out of the clinical work and then how much notice will you provide so ethically here? It’s probably similar for you. Ashley Mielke 00:11:38 We have to give a minimum 60 day notice of any change. And I think that’s reasonable. I would give more. I just was, you know, it was important to me. My clients had that heads up that like, hey, six months from now, things are going to look a lot different, but we’re going to have a lot of time to complete your treatment plan. And if we need to, we will refer internally. And I made sure that handoff happened properly. So that went really well giving myself that time. So you’ll want to take a look at that and how much time you’ll actually need The other thing that we did as we went, which I’m so glad we did, was we created standard operating procedures and a video library as we went along. So this isn’t like you don’t have to get your ducks in a row. I don’t know if that’s ever even a thing before you make this. It’s kind of like doing it as you go. So we have a video library of all the FAQs that therapists and admin would constantly reach out to me about hey, how do we do this again? Or do we have a process for this? So every time a question would come up, let’s use the example of an internal referral. Ashley Mielke 00:12:43 Hey, how do I do an internal referral? Well let’s create that process right now. Da da da da da. It’s six steps. How does this look? I would have the clinical directors look at it. Yeah. This is great. It’s all ethical. There’s our process. And every time a question was asked, we created a process. That’s how we do it. So now we have like 40 standard operating procedures or something like that, maybe even more of just everything you can think of. We have created a process. So now if you work for me, you don’t have to text me an email me asking you go straight to the Google Drive, you go straight to the video library and all I did is pick up my phone, make some quick 32nd to 62nd videos about certain things, pop it in the drive there. And again, this is going to help streamline your systems and eliminate you from having to be a part of that process. The other thing that’s really important is supporting your team throughout the transition. Ashley Mielke 00:13:45 So this is with any transition you go through. when I started this journey, like I said about four years ago, working, I was working with a business consultant and she’s wonderful. And she said, okay, Ashley, I know that you’re so excited about all your goals and your plans and you want to do all these things, but we also need to make sure that the, you know, the, the feelings, are considered, like your therapist. Feelings and experiences are also considered, right? They might not be ready to move as quickly as you are. Right? Like, if you’re like, okay, well, I’m leaving, so I’m not going to see clients anymore. Bye, guys. They’re like, oh, but what what what does that mean for us? What happens to us? We’re just so used to seeing you. Like so when I started to step away, there was, it was difficult for the team because I was the heartbeat of the Grief and Trauma healing center. Ashley Mielke 00:14:39 Right? I am the brand. I am the culture. I’m all the pieces. So as we, you know, when we were this beautiful little tight knit team of eight people, which was amazing and wonderful, one of my favorite, you know, phases of the business because we just did everything together. And I was always there as we, you know, doubled in a year to, say, 16 therapists. That was a big transition. So Ashley was no longer as a as accessible. And so, communicating those goals and being really transparent, talking about emotions, which we know we’re all really great at as therapists was really important. So always consider the needs of your team and make sure that they feel supported throughout the transition. And lastly, be flexible and patient. As with any transition, there will be unexpected bumps and setbacks along the way. there’s no guarantees, but I think a big thing, at least for me, and taking kind of those calculated risks in my business is, you know, really at the end of the day, what have I got to lose? And if I don’t take this risk, I’m the one that’s going to live with regret. Ashley Mielke 00:15:49 Like, what is the worst thing that’s going to happen? So when we opened our second location almost two years ago, I, you know, that was a big scary jump. The rent was significantly higher than my first location. So $6,500 a month rent. Plus I had to furnish the place. Okay, five offices, a kitchen, a group room. I mean this like 35,000 in furniture and then okay, our we’re going to have to now double our team. We’re going to have to grow our team. And what’s that going to look like. And what’s that going to mean for me going from two locations. So it was very scary to take that leap. But I’m so glad that we did. It’s thriving our second location and the team did really well in terms of adjusting, so really supporting them emotionally through that transition was key. So I mean, if you’re there and you’re ready to take those leaps of faith because you are really feeling called to grow your impact as a business owner and as a practice, then I say, you know, jump in. Ashley Mielke 00:16:47 So plan ahead. Give yourself at least 12 to 24 months to fully transition unless you, you know, you’re just ready to go and you’ve got it all figured out and you’ve got a team to step in. But I think this is a reasonable amount of time that would feel comfortable, and you might actually extend that. Like I said, it took me like four years, but I wasn’t really planning. I wasn’t like, okay, I’m going to do this and then this. And then, you know, by this time I’m going to be out. It just happened that way. But I did start to make that transition about four years ago. And, and it felt really good to create that time freedom for me, which was really key to what I was looking to do as kind of moving into that CEO position. So now let’s imagine we’re taking this this transition. Here are some things that you want to consider leveraging with your newfound freedom. I think it’s really important that we create a weekly and monthly flow of your work schedule, with business development as a priority. Ashley Mielke 00:17:44 So we use Trello. I don’t know if you use Trello to create little boards. It’s free. It’s a great tool for creating a schedule. So I have my daily, weekly, bi weekly, monthly annual tasks, and it has a little checklist so you can check things off every month. And it’s a really great way also to batch out when and how you do things. So for example, let’s say you’re vetting your social media. Maybe it’s Wednesday mornings. You vet all the social media posts that are going to go out the next week, and you batch those things out. I know I’ve got batching. Oh, here it is. The fourth point batch out your to do’s, right? Really make use of that time. Maybe Monday is an administrative day where you just you bang out a bunch of things, and then you have a couple of days where it’s just for you. I don’t know, right? You want to really think about how you want to create that ideal schedule for yourself? another point is you want to determine what your salary would look like. Ashley Mielke 00:18:42 Are you going to pay yourself what you’re paying yourself as a clinician and just recognize that even though you may not be generating income, you can still afford to pay yourself that wage through a dividend or a salary, whatever that looks like for you. Just make sure that as you’re monitoring your numbers, that you can afford to be that CEO without generating revenue. Okay. schedule much deserved play into your week. This is important because this is often neglected socially. As business owners, entrepreneurs, we never really turn our brains off. We’re always just working hard and always constantly thinking of ways to grow our business. So it’s easy to then fill that space with other things, which is great. But if you have that time, schedule right into your calendar, that’s what I do. So the team at pop knows that I love playing hockey. I’m a true Canadian over here, so I play shinny through the week. If I can do a Monday shinny at 11 a.m., that just makes my life. So if I can be on the ice a couple days a week and schedule that in throughout the workday, that is, that’s a win for me. Ashley Mielke 00:19:47 It might also be things like, another thing that’s important to me is I drop off my son at school in the morning and I pick him up. So, you know, I’ve created a schedule that works really well for my family. I don’t work evenings, I don’t work weekends. I don’t commit to things outside of that kind of boundary time. That’s really important. And the other thing I do now in the business is I do all the corporate workshops and trainings. So because we specialize in grief and trauma, there are we get multiple requests to go into large companies. So for example, next week I’m doing with one with Alberta Health Services, which is, you know, a large organization here in Edmonton. So I’ll be going in and doing a two hour grief and suicide training for them. I love to facilitate. I love to train. So I do most of the corporate work, which also is a higher level of pay, and it’s still generates some income for the business. The other thing you want to think about is determine how you’ll stay connected to your team. Ashley Mielke 00:20:40 So something we were doing, which is really great. Now I’m on like a maternity leave, sort of. We’re not doing it right now, but we would do monthly lunches with Ashe. So I would bring lunch into the team. I’d go to one location one month, the next location the next month, bring in lunch, hang out with the team, be present. I think that’s really important is if you are out of the day to day, you still want to be available and present, having that rapport and that connection. And maybe you decide that you actually work in office 1 to 2 days a week. So you might not be seeing clients, but you’re doing administrative related work. So think about what you would like that to look like and would also appeal to the needs of your team. Other things monitoring important numbers. So this might seem really obvious, but I think it is important to to track. Do not get so comfortable being out of the day to day like business is running. Ashley Mielke 00:21:37 We’re all good. And then before you, you know, you open up your bank statement, you open up your bank app and you realize that you have no money because you haven’t been paying attention to the ebbs and flows of your practice. So some of those obvious numbers that you want to look at, especially the profit and loss statement each month, is what is your gross revenue every month. We have a little tracker that I plug in numbers. It’s like monthly financial something or monthly finances, I think I say. So I tracked gross revenue. We look at net profit. We do the profit margin. So we look at okay, where are we at in terms of our margins? I check the bank account every single day. I open up my TD app and I check how much cash is in there to make sure that we always have enough cash, like operating capital, right? So that’s available to pay all of your bills and to pay yourself and to pay your team. And if you’re building up that net profit, that cash in your business, then that’s awesome, because then you can use that to reinvest in your growth. Ashley Mielke 00:22:33 So maybe opening your next location, hiring an operations manager, those kinds of things. the other numbers you want to look at are what are your expenses? Are there ways to eliminate some of the overhead? Are you paying for subscriptions that you’re not using? You know, it’s those small things that add up. I mean, do the math. Say you pay a $30 subscription a month and you’re not using it $30 times 12. That’s a lot of money that you’re throwing away. Other things we look at booking rates, therapist and client retention, new bookings. Right. We look at. Okay, how how are the new intakes? What are the booking rates for our therapists? I have my admin team generate a whole thing for our month monthly meeting so I don’t do a thing. She does all the work for me. What are our new intakes? How many new arrivals? how many credit cards were declined this month? I mean, all the nitty gritty. I meet with, our admin and our biller to look at all of this stuff, plus therapist and client retention to make sure everyone is doing a great job. Ashley Mielke 00:23:34 And then the demand for more therapists, maybe you realize, oh my gosh, we’re we have all these waitlists. It’s time to hire. Okay. Or maybe you’re like, oh, it’s a really slow time. We want to kind of think of some outside the box marketing strategies to bring in new intakes. The other thing you want to do is schedule quarterly or bi annual meetings with your marketing team. I assume that you have hired someone at this point of your growth that is now managing your Google ad campaigns. Maybe you do social media campaigns. Look at what your what is your monthly marketing spend? How are your current ad campaigns performing? Do you need to, you know, do they need some tweaks? Do you need to do a website audit? How is everything functioning? How is your SEO doing? What are your clicks per your, rate per click? for conversions. Like what? You know, these are things that your marketing team can teach you about that are really key for your success. Ashley Mielke 00:24:25 So we upfront invested a lot of money into our search engine optimization. This was about seven years ago. We’ve been in business for almost 11 years. So maybe seven, eight years ago we paid a ton into search engine optimization. It paid off for us. So so I highly recommend it. now we gross. I mean, we grossed about 150,000 a month, so. And we only pay Google $1,000 a month for our Google ad spend $1,000 because we invested in that organic search. so that’s something I do recommend if you’re looking at, you know, we’re spending maybe way too much in marketing right now. and then you can sort of make some plans for the years as you’re growing and hopefully reduce the need to spend too much with Google as your search engine optimization continues to grow successfully on Google. have your lawyer or HR team review your contract for any updates you’d like to make at the next renewal. Again, as your company grows, your liability grows. So when I started out, a friend of mine, she had a practice. Ashley Mielke 00:25:32 I was like, anyone have a contract? I can use her. Here we go. I didn’t even, I don’t know, legal jargon. I’m like, great, this looks nice. And I had my contractor sign. And then I was like, hey, no, I have to get serious about these things. So I paid my lawyer, you know, crap ton of money. It was like $5,000 for legal contract agreement. Employee agreement so that I knew I was protected. So you want to always consider your liability. And then the last thing here, review your gross revenue growth and net profit growth each year and determine what shifts you like to make the next corporate year to allow for sustainability and growth. Again, how much did you profit at the end of the year? Are you looking to grow? Anytime we grow and reinvest our cash, we can expect that. You know, the year is not going to look as great for us because of growth. That’s not a bad thing. So you might not profit as much the next year. Ashley Mielke 00:26:27 But we know that investing in our businesses is necessary if you want to take it to that next level. And you can always talk to your accountant. I mean, I’m just one of those people, to be very honest. That’s just like I get really excited about something and then I’m all in and I just do it, and my accountant’s like, I, I don’t know if that was the best idea, but I’m also like, this is probably why we have the success we have, because I don’t let these, these things, you know, fear get in the way and we just figure it out as we go. Joe Sanok 00:27:06 I am so excited about alma. When I had my private practice, I struggled building my caseload, attracting the right clients, managing the business side. And honestly, one of the reasons I didn’t take insurance was it was so difficult to navigate. So many of my consulting clients deal with these problems as well, and almost supports clinicians in building rewarding private practices with simplified insurance credentialing in under 45 days, enhanced reimbursement rates, and guaranteed two week payback, plus a free profile in their searchable filter directory, making it easy for clients who are the right fit for your practice to find you. Joe Sanok 00:27:46 Learn more about how alma could support your private practice at hello alma. Com forward slash Jo. That’s. Hello alma.com/jo to learn more. Ashley Mielke 00:28:01 Future growth considerations. So assess what tasks you’d like to keep and which you’d like to delegate. So you might decide okay, I’ve got this awesome team. But man I’m really bogged down with these random tasks. Okay. So start to look at maybe hiring again. What are the other positions that you can move people into in terms of leadership? For us, it was like director of people and culture, director of operations. Maybe it’s a social media manager, maybe it’s a pillar so that you can continue to move out of the day to day. And then with all this freedom, you can look at things like opening multiple locations, expanding your practice, introducing other services. Maybe you start a podcast like, you know, Jo, maybe you start to do some consulting on the side. Maybe you really step into that corporate world, or maybe you want to do some coaching. Ashley Mielke 00:28:52 There’s all sorts of opportunities we have as therapists. Maybe you want to write a book and do speaking. what other passions do you have that could leverage brand awareness in your community? So something I started in honor of my dad’s ten year anniversary of his death is I started, an annual fundraiser called the Hope campaign. So every year we choose a local nonprofit or charity to raise money for. So we’ve raised almost $50,000 for local charities. I’m so passionate about philanthropy. So now, because I’m not in the day to day, I can really focus on raising money for worthy causes in our community, and there’s really no gain to us financially going and doing that. But the gain is that brand awareness. So when we held our Hope brunch and we had, you know, it’s sold out at like 200 people and people are buzzing about this campaign and we supported this beautiful, nonprofit. It’s an awesome way to leverage your brand and get people to get in front of people to talk about what you do, so that was very cool. Ashley Mielke 00:29:59 Also, if you are planning to exit your business in the future, right? This is also a possibility, my friends. It’s something I think we don’t talk about often enough. Like, what if I wanted to leave my practice? What if I want to sell it? Great. Joe talked about how he sold his, and he moved into starting the practice of the practice. So here are a couple of things you want to think about. You’re going to determine your EBITDA. Your earnings before interest taxes deductions. No I forget what it is an amortization. What is the D. Anyone know. Just Google it. You want to determine your EBITDA which is essentially another. It’s another number that’s like a net profit that takes into consideration of taxes, amortization, that kind of thing. And then you aim for a multiplier of three, 3 to 4 times. So let’s say your EBITDA is $100,000 you plus your assets. So say you have 50,000 in assets. That would be your website, your Google ads, your brand awareness, your furniture. Ashley Mielke 00:31:02 Let’s say you’ve got 50,000 in assets and then 100,000 is your EBITDA. You’d be looking at, say, 3 to 400,000 plus the 50. So 350 to 450,000 would be a good sale price. Now one thing to remember though is that what you value your business at is not necessarily what others will value it at. I read an awesome book by Annie Duke. Highly recommend it. It’s called Quite Brilliant. It talks all about businesses that are exiting, business owners that are exiting their companies, and how we because we pour all the blood, sweat and tears into our hard work. Sometimes it’s really hard for us to part with our businesses because other people don’t value it the way that we do. So I might say, you know, my company is so successful, I value it at $1 million. And then, you know, a company is going to come along and say, well, no one’s ever going to pay you for that, right? Here are the numbers, Here are the assets. Here’s the most I’m willing to pay. Ashley Mielke 00:31:56 So we also have to look at what is the value of what people are actually willing to buy it for. And if you’re ready to move on, does that feel like a win win for you? So just something to think about. If you are planning to exit your business at some point, and an asset of being out of the day to day is you say, hey, this business runs without me. So when you step in as the new business owner, you step in and take on the 3 or 4 major tasks that I do, right? You’re not the clinical supervisor. You’re not seeing 20 clients a week. You’re not the biller, the administrator. So those are all things to think about. Okay, so my last question for you and then we’ll jump into our Q&A is what is that first step that you’re going to take to begin this transition? So if you’re already there and now you’re even more excited, just make that commitment to yourself. What step am I going to take to begin transitioning out of the day to day? And now we’ll have our Q&A. Joe Sanok 00:33:00 so let’s see some questions coming in here. So I did put in, what that Abita is what it stands for. It’s funny. Ash, this is the second time in a week that I’ve heard that term. I was meeting with some friends, having coffee, and they’re really into buying boring businesses. So one guy’s looking at buying a roofing company. This other guy, they just bought this, like, like, like fabric. upholster company. They they know nothing about it. But they went through this whole process of buying, boring businesses. And I had heard this term before. But it’s funny that in a week, you know, I’ve heard it twice now in valuing businesses. all right, so we have this is excellent, Ashley. Thank you. Also, just hey, real quick, if you do have thoughts or emotions around this, feel free to pick an emoji, that you either put as your reaction or that you put in the chat. It’s always fun to just see, like, did this blow your mind? Did it make you smile? Is it inspiring? So first question is, what was one of your most beneficial early steps to transition out of the day to day? Ashley Mielke 00:34:03 The first step that I took, as I shared earlier was creating that bucket list. Ashley Mielke 00:34:07 So every single thing you do in your role, from putting a stamp on an envelope and walking to the mailbox like I’m talking everything you do like going to Walmart to, buy milk or cream for your coffee. So every task, write it down and then start to highlight the tasks you’re ready to delegate. And there you will have your positions. You’ll have administrative tasks. You’ll have clinical tasks. You’ll have people and HR related tasks. That was the first step in getting really clear on where I was ready to delegate first. That’s how I created the clinical director role to begin with and the subsequent subsequent roles that I hired for. Joe Sanok 00:34:51 So good. oh, we got some people saying that they’ve signed up for group practice, boss. Somewhere in next level practice filled up and now doing group practice. Awesome. Ellen has done every one of our programs. She’s now an ABA, which is audience building academy. And, you know, she’s just leveling up in all these other ways. Awesome. All right, next question. Joe Sanok 00:35:11 My wife, Christina and I, oh, my wife, Christina, and I just leveled up to group practice boss from group practice launch. What a great community we have here. Oh, so many people leveling up, I love this. It’s as if this week is around leveling up. awesome. And, And it’s a mark leveled up. Mark, I’m going to make you raise your rates again. I still remember that conversation talking through his rates. And that’s one thing. Oftentimes in next level practice or group practice, boss we talk about is raising rates. And it always makes people feel icky. And then they do it and they’re like, oh my gosh, I’ve been undervaluing myself. so I’m going to put that link again for group practice boss in the chat. So some of you are asking me privately about that. We’re not having a ton of questions because probably you covered everything I want to know other than hockey. now that you have more free time and you know you’re a new mom, so obviously you’re putting time into that. Joe Sanok 00:35:59 But, like, what? What lights you up? What? What gets you excited outside of your practice? That now you can do that when you were in the thick of running your business, you couldn’t do. Ashley Mielke 00:36:09 I think honestly, it really is the things that I mentioned. I really love that. Now when I’m working with the the couple of clients that I’ve recently taken on that I’ve done that with intention That feels really good for me. It’s not out of necessity. So me seeing clients for clients is because I love the work that I do. It’s the reason why I started the company. The other thing is I love consulting. I love being able to now support other therapists in growing and scaling their group practices. That brings me so much joy and the added value of hey, I’ve done it. I’ve made all these mistakes, Let me save you for making those mistakes. Here’s my processes. Like I just give stuff away, Joe and that makes me brings me lots of joy. I say people probably years of pain. Ashley Mielke 00:36:55 because I’ve had to learn the hard ways in so many times. So I’m really loving the consulting. And then I love that I just get to have that quality time, structure time with my family, my kids, and, get to be out, you know, lacing up at the rink as often as possible. So, please, all those things, I just I get to be intentional about what I do. That’s what I love. I get to choose what I’m doing. Joe Sanok 00:37:20 Yeah, well, I think that for me, and I see a couple of questions coming in, so we’ll jump to those. But for me, I feel like I’m a better business leader because I don’t I don’t have like, anger or regret or, resentment towards my business. It’s not like, oh, I had to miss my kids theater thing during the day, and I couldn’t chaperone it because I have this stupid business. it’s like I walk my daughter to school every morning at 9 a.m. and pick her up at 345. Joe Sanok 00:37:48 You know, we’re two blocks away from the school. I volunteered at this school. You know, we have this group called the iPads, the Eastern Badass Dads. And, you know, we do things together and it’s just like, you know, I do improv every Tuesday and sometimes Wednesday. Like this week we had improv a show on Sunday, improv on Tuesday. Like, I mean, it was just like a crazy improv week. But I don’t know about you, but do you feel like then you don’t resent the business? And when you do show up to work, you’re just like on fire for it? Ashley Mielke 00:38:14 Absolutely, absolutely. And I really love the mentorship. So I love supporting the therapists and building out just their confidence in our area and being more of a consultant to the team and really empowering them and their autonomy, especially the leadership team. so it’s it’s a new dynamic and it feels really good to be in this position now. Joe Sanok 00:38:36 I am going to do a party emoji as my reaction because Aubrey just filed their LLC 30 minutes ago. Ashley Mielke 00:38:46 Oh, yeah. Joe Sanok 00:38:46 Insane. You are at the beginning. We are here for you. So the question is, when did you recognize the need to expand beyond just yourself in private practice? Did you hire clinicians as 1099 or W-2s even or whatever the equivalent is in Canada? And I’ll weigh in on that for you, ash, if there’s anything I can add, which probably I won’t be able to add much, you know, compared to you. Ashley Mielke 00:39:07 Sure. So we are a 1099 model or we just say independent contractors here. It’s really the norm. So that’s what the the model is we have. So I knew I was ready when I could no longer take on new clients, that I was pretty full. I now had a wait list, and I had a really good friend who said, hey, I’d love to come work with you. So that worked out really well. And she came on. And then it was like, oh, when she was full, we knew we were ready to hire the next one, and we jumped around offices until we leased our own office space about 3 or 4 years into the business. Speaker 4 00:39:38 Yeah. Joe Sanok 00:39:39 Yeah. So for me I, and I wouldn’t necessarily say this is how you should do it now, but I started my company as a side gig working at a community college. And then I had for 1099 before I left that full time job. And so really it was, I have this office, I’m going to use it Monday and Wednesday nights. And then I found someone else that could do Tuesday, Thursday nights, find someone else that could do the weekends, had someone else that could do during the day. So just kind of filled in that one office. Until then, I upgraded to a four office suite view of the water while I still had my full time job. now, I think what we’re seeing, at least in the States, is that W2 employees are staying longer. You’re getting better quality candidates, and if you can do a session rate, not a percentage, that tends to attract more people and you want that to be about 35 to 40% of whatever the total session is to give yourself room for taxes, room for admin, room for your own profit. Joe Sanok 00:40:31 If you’re doing that like 65 or 70, 30 split, you just don’t have enough money to do anything. and so we’re seeing that. And then as soon as that person is up to around 15 clients a week doing a flat salary for a 20 hour week to give them about five hours that they can be doing progress notes, marketing, things like that. You’re then competing against the community, mental health, the non-profits instead of private practice because the W2 people definitely want to have that security more than the 1099 people. At least what we’re seeing in the States with our consulting clients. And then really, when they’re at 25 sessions a week, that’s when looking at full time salary and having that be based on usually a 35 hour work week, workweek. because you can be more competitive then, you know, think about when you worked, if you worked in a nonprofit or I worked at CMH, it was definitely 40 plus hours a week. You’re on call and you’re not making great money. If someone had said, okay, you’re making 45 K at CMH, or you could make 52 K in private practice and be guaranteed to only work 35 hours a week and do 25 clinical sessions. Joe Sanok 00:41:30 I would have applied for that job all day long. So that’s what we’re seeing in regards to a competitive hiring market. and I’m not sure if that’s different in Canada. are you seeing any of those trends that are shifting? I know you’re not as much in the day to day, but what are you hearing? Ashley Mielke 00:41:44 No. Like, at least here the model is a 1099. Everybody wants to be a contractor. No one wants to be an employee. So the people who are choosing private practice are very different than the people who are choosing to go work for the government or like, you know, a non-profit agency as an employee. so a lot of them are making that move so they can make more money and work less hours. Joe Sanok 00:42:05 That’s awesome. Aubrey. I’m going to reply to yours since you just got started. next level practice if you haven’t signed up for that. here’s the link. And then also make sure you do. NLP 40 or NLP 400 to get that discount. it’ll bring it down to I think it’s one. Joe Sanok 00:42:22 It’ll bring down to 119 per month instead of 159 a month, or it’ll bring it down from that 1590 to that 1990 for the year. So you get two months free and 400 bucks off or 40 bucks a month off. So definitely want to help you in that community. We have a ton of people that are just getting going. Next question. What tool dashboard do you use to see track your financials? Ashley Mielke 00:42:43 We use Jane. Everyone in the pop community knows that. I am such an advocate for Jane. That is her name. The name? It’s a practice management tool that can be used in Canada and the US. It’s very affordable. And the nice thing is it’s it allows for that scalability in your business. It provides all the reporting that you could possibly imagine for your business. Joe Sanok 00:43:05 Yeah. And here in the States, Jane is good. therapy notes is good in regards to the EHR and looking at the money usually. Then you integrate that into a QuickBooks that also integrates with your book, with your, bank and your credit cards. Joe Sanok 00:43:18 don’t do it manually. It’s such a waste of time for the ten bucks a month that a QuickBooks is or, you know, having a therapy notes or. Jane, it’s so worth it to have those automations. my first couple of years, I literally just kept receipts in a drawer and added them up at the end of the year for like five hours. It was like, what the hell am I doing here? Ashley Mielke 00:43:35 I did the exact same thing, Joe. Speaker 4 00:43:37 Oh yeah. Ashley Mielke 00:43:38 So yes, we use QuickBooks and chain, and that’s how our paper creates our PNL statements. Speaker 4 00:43:44 Yeah. Perfect. Yep. Joe Sanok 00:43:45 And over time, you’re going to want to have a bookkeeper that’s looking at kind of the day to day than an accountant that’s looking at the big picture, looking at tax strategy, you know, to say, hey, and the states, if you put money into a health savings account or put money into a 529 account for your kids, or do you know a simple IRA or a SAP, you know you can have different tax implications where, you know the business isn’t taxed nearly as highly. Joe Sanok 00:44:07 Even if you are an online company, you know you can file in a different state oftentimes, obviously talk to your attorney and accountant about that. But like, we’re a Wyoming based company because Wyoming has different taxes than Michigan. So I’m an employee of a Wyoming company. I pay Michigan taxes as the employee, but not as the full corporation. And so a good accountant can help you look at, you know, yeah, if you’re just like a local Michigan counseling practice, like that would look super sketch if you’re out of Wyoming. But if you have an online business like myself, you can do those tax strategies and an accountant can help you with that. All right. We have, Joe, I’m loving the content through this entire series. Yeah, I’ve seen you in a bunch of these. I’m glad you’re here. in talks, I specifically signed up for. Wanted to know what would be a good fit for us in terms of membership, as I have a group practice, but we only have two life and relationship coaches who work part time. Joe Sanok 00:44:56 I want to hire therapists now and admin staff. I’d love to hop on a call to discuss, as my goal this year is to scale up our practice. Absolutely. That’s why next week we have three times anyone that’s like, I feel like I should be in this community. I’m not sure I don’t want to sign up and then do it wrong. We work with you, so if you do, sign up for the wrong one. even if we realize that a week or two in, we just figure it out. If we need to refund you, if we need to change it, we make it super easy. Jen and Kate and myself walk you through that whole onboarding process. next week I am going to be doing Q and A’s specifically around kind of your questions on membership. Hearing that, though you already have hired you are a group practice boss and so group practice boss would be best for you. You then also have access to group practice launch. So that entire program you can go back through as part of your membership in a group practice boss and you get access to next level practice. Joe Sanok 00:45:46 So a really great thing if you already are in established group practice. Now, I know that we’re already at the end of our time. Ashe, thank you so much for hanging out with us. This was amazing. You are such a rock star. Glad that you’re back from maternity leave and talk to you soon. Bye! Today’s episode is brought to you by alma, and as a clinician, you probably chose this field because you wanted to support people in navigating challenges and finding personal growth. I know for myself, the paperwork, the logistics, all of that got in the way of doing the actual clinical work that I absolutely loved. But many mental health care providers end up spending almost as much time on billing, insurance, and other documentation as you do in seeing sessions with clients. That’s where all work at home. Alma supports clinicians in building rewarding private practices with simplified insurance credentialing in under 45 days, enhanced reimbursement rates and guaranteed two week paybacks, plus a free profile in their searchable filter directory, making it easy for clients who are the right fit for your practice to find you. Joe Sanok 00:46:59 Learn more about how Alma can support you in building a thriving private practice at. Hello, alma. Com forward slash Jo. That’s. Hello alma.com/jo. Learn more. Special thanks to the band Silence is Sexy for that intro music, and this podcast is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regard to the subject matter covered. It is given with the understanding that neither the host, the producers, the publishers or guests are rendering legal, accounting, clinical or other professional information. If you want a professional, you should find one.