Andrew Burdette 00:00:00 The grow a Group practice podcast is part of the practice of the Practice Network, a network of podcasts to help you grow, manage and promote your business and yourself. To hear the other podcasts like The Practice of the Practice Podcast, go to practice at the practice.com backslash network. You’re listening to the grow a Group Practice podcast, a podcast focused on helping people start, grow, and scale a group practice. Each week you’ll hear topics that are relevant to group practice owners. I’m Andrew Burdette, a practice owner, and I love to hear from people, their stories, and real life experiences. Let’s get started. Hello and thanks again for joining me on the grow Group practice podcast. Today I’m here with Shannon Seaborn, who is the co-founder of Cloud Med Spa, which is a utilization management company that is quote unquote, the Airbnb of health care. So thanks for joining us. And I’m. Office space in real estate and utilization of those types of resources is definitely a topic that comes up a lot with group practices in particular, and how to maximize and trying to think about what kind of space people need. Andrew Burdette 00:01:17 So, I’m sure this will be a really interesting topic to talk to you. Someone that’s in the field about, and the listeners will find it that way, too. I usually like to invite people to just start with a little bit of background on how you got to be where you are currently and, and explain a little bit more about what’s unique about what you do. Shannon Seeberan 00:01:36 well, thanks for having me. I would love to say where I got was planned out strategically, but it wasn’t. I think a lot of us could say our life kind of took that path. for many years I was in the consulting side of healthcare, primarily working with dermatologists on transitioning their practice from, traditional medical derm, patients into more of aesthetic derm patients. It was a space that was lucrative for my clients, obviously more of a cash based business, something they had more control of in a versus, you know, the typical medical space, which is, a constant struggle with insurance and, as you know, and things like that. Shannon Seeberan 00:02:20 So after many years of consulting in, medical derm and aesthetics, I was introduced to the founder of Cloud Med Spa family and took off on this venture, which was solving the problem, in the practitioners side of medical aesthetics, really leveraging a ton of growth in this space, but also empowering the practitioner, in medical aesthetics to leverage autonomy, entrepreneurship, things like that. since then, Cloud Med Spa has pivoted to a software platform that enables and supports our client with leveraging underutilized space for their, typically their larger asset, which is their lease or mortgage of where they where they practice, and being able to offer a shared space option, generate revenue for themselves, help control their overhead, help cover costs if anything, create a profit for opportunity and for utilization of their space. The majority of our clients have too large of a footprint that they work within, that they were convinced to sign a lease on a space much larger than they need, or they’re working multiple spaces a few days a week at each space. Shannon Seeberan 00:03:42 So just a smarter way of of managing this space that you own and creating more access for additional practitioners. Andrew Burdette 00:03:51 Cool. thinking of different types of practices and things like that. And as a group owner locally in Asheville, my friends and colleagues have kind of a range of of size, about either size of practice. And then how many rooms are going to have to go with it. and just also that mix between, say, in-person and telehealth. And you and I had a time we were talking about how the pandemic really shifted the need for commercial space and whether or not you needed an outside office in the first place. do you want to talk a little bit about what you noticed during Covid and then some of the choices, and we can talk a little bit about at least some of the choices that, from the mental health perspective, may or may not have prompted people to either seek out office space or give up office space as a result of remote working. Shannon Seeberan 00:04:39 Yeah, I think pre-COVID and still to this day, with a large percentage of practitioners and private practice practitioners, they really felt like the valuation of their brand, of who they are or their practice existed with the actual physical brick and mortar space and coming out of med school for a lot of providers, it was the one way in was buying into an existing practice or, leveraging the purchase of a practice of a retired physician, things like that. Shannon Seeberan 00:05:14 And I really think the pandemic highlighted how much of a crutch real estate is on, group practices and private practices and how during the pandemic, when people couldn’t come in to see their providers, insurance wasn’t yet ready to understand compensation on remote telehealth medicine. It was a mess. And I’m sure you know that, too. so as we all, you know, as we reentered in person care, I think everyone wanted to approach it in a smarter way. How do I alleviate my overhead cost of this? basically elephant in the room of my mortgage and my lease to run my practice because I just came off of, let’s say, 18 months of doing telehealth. And I didn’t even use my space, for example, seeing my patients. And so we obviously went through that same effect because our business started pre-pandemic, and we came out of it realizing that there’s a smarter way. Shared space really also became very industrious and big during the pandemic. People wanted to continue to see patients, but they wanted to control the space that they were in versus having, a large office where people were bumping into each other. Shannon Seeberan 00:06:36 So how can I just see my patient in a safe, healthy way? And so shared space is really took off to help support that aspect of in-person care during the pandemic. And here we are, again, realizing that people can down, reduce their overhead costs by if they’re only in the office two days a week, or if in aerospace in a space where there’s, you know, too much, too many exam rooms and what they’re currently using, it’s a great way to diversify the practitioner specialty that’s in the space. It’s a great way to reduce everyone’s costs. It’s a win for everyone. And that what we’ve also realized is the patient provider relationship is where the value is, not this the actual building? At the end of the day, we know we go to see our provider because of our relationship with them. So whether they’re seeing us in a room that might be utilized by someone else on the days, you know, I would never know that as a patient. So I think we’ve really highlighted the aspect and the benefit to shared space, allowing group practices, private practices to leverage that space in a smarter way, reduce their overhead and remove a little bit of that risk as well. Andrew Burdette 00:07:52 I think just for clarity of terms for listeners out there. there’s what’s called co-working spaces. I actually had signed up for one in Asheville. That’s pretty cool because I like to work late, so I’d like to just go somewhere that’s not sitting at home to go do my homework, quote unquote, kind of after dinner hours and that kind of thing. And not all the coffee shops around here are always open. So, but that kind of space is a large room. There are some kind of private little phone booth things you can kind of allocate for an hour or two as part of the membership fee. But in general, it’s just a big room that people can kind of, you know, like a library study room kind of thing. so not something I could do telehealth from it all, but it’s great for admin. and kind of the other end of that is where you have dedicated full time space. That’s your own. So that’s what most people think of when they think of office space, where it’s, you know, paying to lease this space for 24 over seven, 365 for however many years the term of the lease is. Andrew Burdette 00:08:51 And I get full agency of what the space looks like and whether or not I can sublet it out and these other things. And so you’re talking about kind of if I only want Tuesdays to have a service that I could just look for Tuesdays in Asheville and then find a room to book on a regular, ongoing basis. Right. Shannon Seeberan 00:09:09 That’s like, yeah, I’m talking our clients are the ones who are on the lease, who own the space or are on the lease, who are realizing that I could leverage and offset my lease, my own personal lease costs by allowing other people to use the space when I’m not here. And so it’s just a smarter way of reducing your overhead, sharing that space, obviously. our clients, you get the say as to who the you know, who the practitioner is, what we what our business is aligned with is that the practitioners are in the medical aesthetics field. So they are medical professionals typically. And utilizing the space anywhere between 5 and 10 hours a month. Individually, it is not a huge amount of time, but if you are in your space two days a week, you could potentially have six different practitioners using your space. Shannon Seeberan 00:10:07 The other days you’re not there. and generating revenue that is basically covering your lease cost. You are now practicing at no overhead. it’s just, you know, a smarter way to leverage that space. The practitioners using your space love it because their name is not on the least for a two year contract. They are free of that responsibility. but they have access to professional, space that obviously, gives them the full autonomy to run their own independent business. Andrew Burdette 00:10:39 Also to just, I guess, clarify language for what most of the mental health world’s used to listening to. Your what you’re describing is like the your client would be the, the actual lease holder. So the person that’s got the ten room suite and the lease and then it’s a way to match to what usually in our world is called a sub letter. And so somebody that kind of is just looking for, for that kind of thing. And locally here, a lot of the sub letters go on the Facebook groups and say who’s got a couch space for Tuesdays or whatever. Andrew Burdette 00:11:07 But yeah, your service is a great way. Shannon Seeberan 00:11:10 To do that. Yeah. Yeah. And this is you know, we I understand the sub letter term. Typically that’s associated a sub letter is associated with a certain utilization amount of a space of like 25% more of the accessible, allotment of utilization of that space. And what we find is our, renters and utilization of the space are a lot lower than that much, much lower. So if it’s ever a concern of the landlord or the building owner or things like that, we encourage our clients to obviously clearly explain that. But also in this day and age where commercial real estate is struggling in most markets. We always say a happy tenant, a robust and healthy tenant that can pay the bills is more attractive to landlords and building owners than the latter. Andrew Burdette 00:12:03 Yeah, some of the spaces I’ve eyeballed at the start of the calendar year are still vacant, and we’re coming up into November at the time of this recording. So yeah, that’s, you know, pricing $2,500 a month times ten months. Andrew Burdette 00:12:16 It’s a lot of money. that’s just sitting there because it’s empty. Shannon Seeberan 00:12:20 It is, it is. And, you know, we you know, we are obviously we find this as a huge solution to a lot of problems in health care, where there’s so many inefficiencies because of compliance and things like that. this software model is completely HIPAA compliant to our clients because you have no visibility as to the who the renters or patients and clients are. That’s completely separate. You can see in the software who is going to be in your space on Monday from 5 to 6, you can see who’s going to be in your space on Thursday for two hours. And that is it. And who’s going to be using your space? But you don’t get any client access. Andrew Burdette 00:13:03 For audience members of this podcast who I know a lot of us. The idea of here’s my space, I get to decorate, it can paint it, can make it feel my own, and all those things. to just share some experience as a as someone that started in solo practice and now has a group and just my own journeys around space, I started with a sublet. Andrew Burdette 00:13:25 I still have it because it’s too cool to get rid of, and everyone’s kind of like, how’d you end up in this space? And I’m glad I have my one day. And it’s been really nice to have just as this bonus room. And the couple times I’ve tried to get rid of it when I’ve given tours to my new hires, they’re like, is this space free? And they’re like, kind of like, yes. And they’re like, cool, I’ll take it. So I always have an employee that’s willing to use that space. but the upside is I pay $100 a month for it. It’s fully furnished. I don’t have to deal with anything. I just show up, use it on my Mondays and go home and that’s it. And it’s really affordable. It’s real easy. if I decide I don’t use it for that full time, you know, Monday day or whatever, it’s it’s not a huge expense relative to other real estate costs. I’m in the western North Carolina Asheville area, and Asheville’s post-pandemic is probably looking between 700 and $1000 per room at the moment. Andrew Burdette 00:14:14 And that’s that gets to be that’s very noticeable if you’re in solo practice and certainly as a group, if if you’re going to try and assign just one person per room, that gets to be a noticeable amount of money. And then you’re also talking, having to fully furnish the space as well. So it’s not just simply like your monthly lease obligations, but, you know, there may be some utilities involved with that. you’re gonna have to furnish things. And having just lost all my furnishings in a in a flood, thanks to the hurricane. you know, I was surprised too, telling things up. I’m like, it’s 4 to $5000 worth of stuff sitting in that office, right? That’s going to have to get replaced. So, having your 24 over seven space might feel good. And it certainly does is someone that does have a full time space. That’s my own, but it is expensive. And the other kind of interesting thing is I recently added a second location. So a second room as I’ve grown my practice and the sublet or asked if she could stay, I was like, I’m happy to have you stay. Andrew Burdette 00:15:17 But primarily everything in that office is her furnishing, so I’m kind of at least haven’t yet redone the aesthetic in that space to for my own. But I don’t have to, because it’s not costing me money to leave it as is. And so for people out there thinking about is what you’re offering a really attractive thing? It really is, because it’s like, hey, I just need in person Tuesday afternoons from noon to five, and then someone could come to your site, book that out. You have no other overhead. That’s it. So if you go to town, yeah. You don’t have to rent. Shannon Seeberan 00:15:52 It’s very clean, right? There’s no responsibility. If you go to town for a month, you’re not paying for the space. And I think what everyone underestimates is how binding a lot of these lease contracts can be. And it’s lovely to have your own space and, you know, and say it’s yours. But at the end of the day, it’s a smarter use of space. Because if you’re again, we’re underestimating the client relationship. Shannon Seeberan 00:16:17 And I think when I’m in, when I’m seeing my therapist, I’m not looking around me, I’m looking at her. And so I’m not underestimating the aesthetics of it. But I also think it is important to just be smarter about your overhead. We are planning for a lot of rainy days these days with not knowing what, you know, the climate, what sort of catastrophes could potentially happen and you want to cushion yourself from those overhead costs, and there’s a smarter way to do it. The other aspect of our business that is very enticing for the potential renters of your space is that independent aesthetic. When I say independent aesthetic practitioners, I am primarily talking about the nurse injector of neurotoxins and fillers. Someone who is doing this as a side hustle. They need access to product, and they cannot easily get access to product at affordable rates on their own. And so when you’re when we have a client sign on, the access to this injectable product is also made for the renters of their space. So now instead of they if they can clearly get their own room down the hall for $700 a month, that’s great. Shannon Seeberan 00:17:29 But they’re not tapped into this product access which they need in order to work independently as a practitioner. So that’s the other layer that we bring to the table is what differentiates us in this fast growing market, where most nurses are pivoting and offering these services because it’s very lucrative for them. We realize a lot of these nurses need the opportunity, the playbook and how to start their business, launch their business and start generating revenue for themselves as a side hustle. And the hiring opportunities are not there. The hiring opportunities at Med spa, plastic surgeons, Durham offices, things like that. And so people want to be off on their own, generating their own revenue, making their own schedule. And so the access to the space, the access to the product is what we are empowering them with. And our clients are winning because they are tapping into a giant marketplace of practitioners who are renters of their space. Andrew Burdette 00:18:28 To relate that over to some of the mental health listeners to this that are like, well, we don’t have products. Andrew Burdette 00:18:34 I’m like, actually, you know, I’m I’m sitting over here, got a set of Thera tappers for eMDR sitting over here that thankfully weren’t in my office that got flooded. But, you know, just the library of books that are in there. The workbooks that you get to, like, work with clients on. all that stuff’s really expensive, actually. Like, looking at what what was the most valuable thing in my office that got lost? It was those kind of products of things of like, you know, workbooks and those other things that, you know, if I was using your service and somebody wanted to come in and just take over, you know, an afternoon one afternoon, they would have access to that library as well. and those types of forms, services, eMDR, tappers, light bars, whatever other types of therapeutic assists that US mental health people have in a very limited capacity too. Shannon Seeberan 00:19:19 So yeah. And I don’t want it. That’s a great point you brought up. I don’t want to limit our marketplace of renters strictly to injectors. Shannon Seeberan 00:19:26 It is the majority of the renter. But we also find most people to be in the wellness healthcare category. So it could be a nutritionist. It could be a massage therapist, it could be an IV hydration therapist. So anyone in that space is privy to this opportunity and accessing these spaces for that. So it’s nice. If you’re a therapist, I would assume it would be great to broaden your referral base as well within this health care wellness space. not it doesn’t have to be injectors. It could be anyone else in the in the wellness space as well. Andrew Burdette 00:20:01 One thing to for listeners and you and I were talking ahead of time, about this, you were asking how Covid changed things. surprisingly like it did take it took some state mandates to pretty much force health insurance companies to cover telehealth that weren’t otherwise doing it. And those mandates stayed around so long as there was an emergency declared. And then plan by plan, or maybe state by state, depending on which state you’re looking at. telehealth may or may not still be covered. Andrew Burdette 00:20:29 I have at least one client that works very large local employer, and their benefits plan excludes telehealth, which I kind of appreciate because it’s a local business, I’m sure trying to support local businesses by not allowing someone to see somebody across the state. but part of the telehealth thing is insurance companies want you to still have an office you could see a client in. So a lot of my colleagues at the start of the pandemic got rid of their office spaces completely. And a workaround was, a lot of us would kind of lease the use of our space for the address. So, you know, charge like 25, 30 bucks a month. Someone could say, hey, like, I’m over in Andrew’s office on the street, with the understanding that they’re fully remote. They’re not really ever going to see a client there. But if the insurance company really wanted to, you know, prove that they could, that was covered. I’m sure a service like yours could do fill in a similar kind of gap. Andrew Burdette 00:21:30 Or if someone could just book an hour a month and that would cover a similar kind of thing in some location, and they could declare that on their contracts. But, how would what are some trends that you maybe notice about or I guess, how do you help somebody realize whether or not their space is being either underutilized or there may be hitting a limit and maybe need to, like, consider additional space? I’m sure you help guide people on both of those. Shannon Seeberan 00:21:56 We do, and that’s a great question we have. We typically take clients through a proforma which shows what their potential based on their space, size and availability. We back into it by saying, okay, you’re in the space 20 hours a week. That means for the other days of the week, you have 38. Let’s just say you have 30 more hours of rental availability, which means 120 hours for the month at a rate of $79. Or for ease of math use. Right now we can say $99 an hour having 30 available rental hours. Shannon Seeberan 00:22:32 If even you rented those out for 15 hours over the course of the month. At $99 an hour, you’re generating $1,500 for yourself and so our system and the software is always telling you where you are from, a percentage of utilization. So it’ll tell you you’re at 30% utilization of your available rental hours. You’re still within a window where you don’t need to necessarily get a second room or expand space or expand access so it stays. It’s smart software that keeps you in the loop and stays ahead of that. For you. It’s this. It’s software that also schedules people. So you’re not on the phone between Jenny and, you know, and Adam saying, no, no, no, Thursday’s taken. I you know, you need to reschedule your clients for Friday. The software is managing all of that. So you’re not in the mix of that. So it’s really a platform. You leverage your users, your renters, access it remotely, schedule their time and access into this space, purchase what they need via the software. Shannon Seeberan 00:23:36 It’s really doing a lot of the work for you. Again, compare it to an Airbnb where Airbnb is managing the insurance side of things for you. It’s making sure all of that the renters in your space are legit, and that there’s coverage for you as an owner and that all of the needs legally to practice are being met, or to use your space as well. So that’s sort of how we typically go about the utilization, of my clients range from one room to six rooms, and you can do a lot with one room, as you know. And so it is, again, just approaching it from a financial perspective, letting our clients know this is the ceiling, potentially with your space. and at the end of the day, it’s an opportunity to start generating revenue from day one that you are already not making because you’re already sitting on top of potential revenue and you’re not tapping into it on the days you’re not there. So getting everyone to think of that. Of just, you know, covering their costs in using their assets in a, in a smarter way. Shannon Seeberan 00:24:48 If. Joe Sanok 00:24:53 You’re someone with a vision for your practice, for your side hustle, and for your personal journey, but when it comes to establishing your path and how to get to where you want to be with your practice, things get a little messy. You’re also someone who would prefer to go in person instead of to groups and listening to everyone else’s story. To me, it sounds like you could benefit from one on one consulting with our experienced practice of the practice consultants from 595 a month and up. You can work with a consultant that will give you more direction and practical, tried and tested tips match to you and your goals. For more information, visit practice of the practice. Com forward slash apply. Again, that’s practice of the practice. Com forward slash apply. Andrew Burdette 00:25:44 For listeners out there. so my my group is a hybrid practice, meaning we’re a mix of in-person. We’re mostly telehealth. it was interesting realizing what the hurricane. I was like, wow, half my caseload and in person. And they’re willing to wait, even though it may be another couple of weeks before I have a dedicated office space to use again. Andrew Burdette 00:26:04 and there’s not really a system like you’re talking about for our Asheville area as a whole. I’ve got some some opportunity. I could go couch surf, I guess, to see clients in with some colleagues that have intact office space. But, in terms of divvying things up, nobody in my practice wants to work Saturdays or Sundays. But in terms of Monday through Friday, we had four of us. Three of us are full time and one’s quarter time. So all sharing a single room and making that work pretty well. So we all have different preferences for which days of the week we want to work in person, or which parts of the day we’re willing to work in person. I’m more the afternoon evening type, so I’m not. I’ll work from home in the mornings, typically, and then drive into an office for the afternoons so somebody else is taking over my morning days. Somebody else had dedicated Tuesdays, somebody else had dedicated Fridays. And you can get a lot of use out of, out of a single room. Andrew Burdette 00:26:58 And I would say, say, realistically, three full time therapists should be able to share a single room. If you all work around each other’s schedules and they’re not wanting to work the same blanket hours day in, day out. Shannon Seeberan 00:27:11 That’s smart. It’s very smart that you guys did that and you were able to pivot and transition into doing that as well. Andrew Burdette 00:27:19 Yeah, my my approach to space is to add a room as needed and then keep up with growth that way. for some of my friends that have practices and then they kind of hit a ceiling for space, what you’re talking about would be a huge opportunity for them to kind of, hey, I’ve got this clinician That’s going to be a really good hire. I don’t physically have space to put them in at the moment, but if I could at least until I can rethink about that, use a service like yours, then they could book out there 2 or 3 days that that person would want and add the additional clinician pretty easily. Shannon Seeberan 00:27:51 And yes, and it’s also a great opportunity for people breaking into the space and starting their practices as well, to sort of avoid some of those overwhelming costs before they start generating their client patient base. Shannon Seeberan 00:28:05 And as they’re in that growth phase, to consider surrounding themselves with peers that are within the same wellness, space and supporting each other from a referral base of a more of a cohesive, all inclusive approach of there’s many aspects of as, as, you know, if therapy of mental health and of wellness and having them all under sort of one roof is a great approach as well. Or under one office as you could say two. So in considering really branching out, networking and growing your patient base that way is another creative way to enter the space. Andrew Burdette 00:28:49 Yeah, my full time space I’ve had for a couple of years now is in the adjoining suite to a direct primary care office, and it’s a mix of, well, the acupuncturist I think is possibly retiring. She she’s out at the end of the summer this year, but it’s been a mix of several different types of practitioners as well as being embedded with the primary care office. And so it’s been really great to have that well-rounded ness, like you’re speaking of to, to talk to people about and, you know, expands networks in different ways because it’s easy to just get siloed in your particular field to where you’re only talking to therapists or only talking to massage people or other things. Speaker 4 00:29:27 Yeah. Shannon Seeberan 00:29:28 Exactly. Yeah. It’s just it’s constant networking, but make it easy on yourself. And I again, it’s just a I. I appreciate having the referral, having the conversation with the potential client so they can actually see on paper what this financially looks like for them, so that they’re fully informed as to whether or not this is a path they want to go down or not. we have opportunities for this venture, this opportunity to be very affordable up front, and we can get it running, turned on and working for a client within two weeks. So this is not a long, turnaround time. we have people on site support with the acquisition of renters and what that looks like. And, you know, it’s it’s a big opportunity in markets where real estate is a real crutch on the practitioner. And, you know, everybody sort of wants you. There’s only so many insurance negotiations and fights. You can have this aspect of your business you can control. And so to empower practitioners and practice owners with that mindset of control. Shannon Seeberan 00:30:39 Understand what you can control. As far as running your. I always say it’s running your practice, but it’s running a business. and really take advantage of those resources and opportunities. Andrew Burdette 00:30:52 How do you how do you help people negotiate things like the security aspect of stuff? So, for example, like getting access to get led into a building, get access to a particular room. as healthcare providers were pretty much required to have locking doors, realized lots of people don’t necessarily lock their office doors depending on the setting. But, you know, there’s always the issues of like keys and entry points and other things like that. Shannon Seeberan 00:31:20 And trust I get it. So, I mean, we we make recommendations that we use ourselves at our own locations. obviously there’s HIPAA compliance with where cameras are placed and used in spaces. They can be used at point of entry to the unit, to the building, or specifically your space. And we encourage our our owners, you know, have that if you are allowing remote access and entry and you should make sure you can, obviously secure any in, you know, any data, any records that you have in the room, so that they are not accessible. Shannon Seeberan 00:32:01 And so it is it could be an adjustment for some of our clients to do so, and to feel safe about having remote access to their space. But at the same time, every one of our clients knows who is in their space. It’s not like you have not met this person. Typically, renters come to the space, see the space, you meet them. It is up to you to decide. At the end of the day, if you want this person have access. it’s not to say you know that, Obviously, you know, you are impenetrable to any sort of, misuse of your space. But at the same time, this is you will know who the user is. nine times out of ten, they’re medical professionals. They’re in already in an occupation that obviously, hopefully there is some ethical behavior that is underlying what they do for a living. but it typically isn’t very hard for, for people to adjust their space to that remote remote access and utilization. Andrew Burdette 00:33:06 Got it. the co-working space I’m on has this really cool. Andrew Burdette 00:33:11 It’s like a magnetic door lock thing. And you download an app to your phone and it geo locates where you are, and you just click a button on your phone and it opens the space up. It’s pretty cool. It’s amazing list of things I’ve seen so far. I’m used to the yeah, just regular old key code things and, you know, keyless entry kind of stuff. actually, I’m probably going to talk to my landlord about a keyless entry for my other location, my newer one, because that’ll simplify keys because of my group practice. And that way I don’t have to make key copies. I can just give people a code and then they can go from there. Shannon Seeberan 00:33:40 And if they can have their own code, you know who it is to obviously. Andrew Burdette 00:33:44 Yeah. my my main office, there’s a practitioner code and there’s a client code and client codes. Stop working after probably 6 or 7:00 at night just to add to, you know, security limitations and those kind of things. And there’s still a deadbolt, but, that kind of boosts things that way. Speaker 4 00:34:06 Great. Shannon Seeberan 00:34:07 Yeah. There’s a there’s definitely a way around it. and managing each space individually. And we have the experience to discuss and those options with our clients. Andrew Burdette 00:34:17 is your software available to somebody that maybe wanted to use it in-house, or are you familiar with something that the question is coming from white. Shannon Seeberan 00:34:28 Label meaning or. Andrew Burdette 00:34:30 I’m thinking like if if I was. When I get to the position, a friend of mine and as in who has probably 15 offices, probably about 15, 16 clinicians, something like that, or let’s say she has ten offices and 15 clinicians. And so some of those offices have to get shared. Is there a way somebody, as a business owner can use your software to do internal booking? Shannon Seeberan 00:34:50 right now there isn’t. Does it mean we can’t figure that out? that would be more of an option if she or he is has that many clinicians. and I know obviously a lot of this work is insurance based. What we empower a lot of our clients with is to pivot. Shannon Seeberan 00:35:10 This doesn’t necessarily apply to your field from being the traditional employer employee basis to now removing the, the liability and the demand of caring employee salaries, everyone using your space isn’t independent. contracted based roughly employee renting the space from you, managing and controlling their revenue as the employer you are alleviated of salary overhead management rotating potential door of of clinicians practitioners of of managing all of that of managing patient acquisition to keep everyone happy and busy. So what we realized with a lot of our employer clients is that the aspect of managing people in a business is not as lucrative as they thought it was, because the costs of overseeing all of the, overseeing that aspect of business is, unless it’s extremely successful, is typically has less of a net than if you pivot and change your business to entrepreneurship and supporting those independent practitioners, the successful practitioners clinicians will thrive the less so will not. So it’s sort of, you know, survival of the fittest in a way. so right now, no, we don’t have that capability. It doesn’t mean we won’t. Shannon Seeberan 00:36:41 but right now, it’s an tool to be leveraged for, independent, entrepreneurial outside practitioners to use the space. Andrew Burdette 00:36:50 There are it’s less common, but there are some of those more alternative models, like you’re talking about. the mental health field generally has shifted over to W2 model, because when you look at classifications of contractor versus employee and how typically a group setting is going to function, your best off having employees to just avoid trouble with the the IRS, among other places. got it. But there are, I know, a number of practices that still very much operated in independent contractor model, and they really do what you’re talking about, which is the very independent oriented thing to where, when I was under the independent contractor model, my, my contractors would basically lease blocks of time like you’re talking about from my office. So they would pay rent to the business to use the space for the hours that they requested. it’s different now having two people. But, there’s also some more interesting models to where I think you’d mentioned before, as we were talking ahead of time, like, you know, some kind of ownership stake in the company. Andrew Burdette 00:37:51 there are some group practices that are kind of shifting toward that to where, you know, you kind of, I guess, in a co-op kind of sense, you might have like a full share or half share type ownership aspect of things. But again, that’s that’s more investment versus independence. And you’re very much talking from the independence perspective too. And Shannon Seeberan 00:38:14 I think this is a great fit for your listeners who feel like they’re in space. That’s massively underutilized, which tends to be more people than, people feel like they’re maxing out the space. And for potential practitioners in your space who are thinking of starting out and doing it in a more cost effective way, or for space owners to consider diversifying who the practitioners in the group are without taking on more salaries and more, you know, just more overhead and risk of, of running a business. So it could still be, you know, the wellness group, but now you have referral basis of all these different practitioners under one roof. it’s a better way to incorporate that without taking on the management and headaches of it. Andrew Burdette 00:39:10 One other thing to add to that for listeners out there is because it’s medical and it’s way more complicated to diversify. Who’s in your practice if you’re going to have them as either contractors or employees? in North Carolina, the secretary of State. We’re pretty much required to have professional LLCs, which means that the licensing board has to give a stamp of approval. That’s not true for all disciplines. It’s true for all mental health. But my partner that’s a physical therapist doesn’t qualify to have a PLC even though she has a doctorate. It’s kind of ridiculous. so there’s there’s the secretary of state level and layer of things, and there’s also the medical board side of things too. it’s probably true in most states, like it is in North Carolina, to where you have to have somebody that is a partial ownership stake in your company to be able to supervise any medical license. So, if you if I wanted to say bring in a prescriber, whether it’s a nurse practitioner or PA, MD, whoever, there would have to be an MD that’s at least a 1% owner in my business. Andrew Burdette 00:40:18 Articles of organization as an LLC, per the medical board, due to the supervision requirements. So again, what you’re talking about removes all of that from the equation. Because I can have my mental health practice, I maybe have a lease for ten rooms and then nine of those can be anybody. I feel like if it’s under your model because yeah, they’re just I’m basically effectively just their landlord. Shannon Seeberan 00:40:40 Correct. You that’s you hit the nail on the head. And our software manages the regulations of each of those practitioners that is using the space. It is not your headache. So the nurse practitioner who wants to use the second room a day out of the week, she does have to provide proof of medical director oversight in the app when she enrolls. It is not your job to vet that. She is also agreeing to terms and conditions that what she is providing as proof of, validation, obviously for her right to practice is under her, obviously her liability. And so most of our practitioners that are medical practitioners using the space are required to provide medical director oversight malpractice insurance in the app before they start. Shannon Seeberan 00:41:32 That is obviously not necessarily privy to all wellness healthcare professions. but the majority, yes, they require that and that. And what’s nice is the software manages that aspect of it. And you are still, your HIPAA compliant. You are liability free because you are a landlord. Andrew Burdette 00:41:53 Got it. That’s awesome. I can think of probably 2 or 3 people around here that would be really interested to learn more about this. I was actually after, the hurricane went through and everybody’s rethinking space again, for the second time in four years. yeah. So I guess key takeaways for anybody listening that you would want to make sure that they remember about what you offer and, and things to consider when they’re thinking about space. Shannon Seeberan 00:42:19 I would say key takeaways is, you know, be smart about your largest investment, which is your space, if you are willing. To think of it as two different aspects offset your overhead costs, but also increasing your own personal brand awareness growth, client growth potential, patient growth potential of your own business. Shannon Seeberan 00:42:43 So it’s a smarter way to sort of have that opportunity to grow your your patient base and also reduce your overhead costs. you know, just obviously approach these opportunities with knowing all the the options out there. We see ourselves as kind of cornering this aspect of the market. We’ve done the homework. We have our own brick and mortars where we’ve been implementing this model. So we’ve, you know, thrown every all of what we thought works against the wall. We’ve learned the hard way. And we’re now presenting our clients with the best option, the best opportunity. We know it works. It’s a successful way to, you know, obviously take advantage of this aspect of leverage and maximize the utilization of your space. Andrew Burdette 00:43:32 Cool. Yeah. And I don’t I don’t know of anybody else doing anything similar, at least not in the commercial space and certainly not for medical. You know. Yeah. This is really cool. Shannon Seeberan 00:43:42 Yeah. So, you know, obviously the best ways obviously to set up a time where we can review what that looks like financially for you. Shannon Seeberan 00:43:51 And so so all of our clients are completely it’s full transparency what the costs are and what your potential take home is as well. This is all about, autonomy, empowering individuals to run their practices in a smarter way. And obviously the pandemic and how things have changed in the landscape of healthcare. you know, there’s a lot of, inefficient ways of accessing more opportunity for practitioners. We see ourselves as an easy option to implement and so obviously information is key. We love to have these conversations with potential clients. Andrew Burdette 00:44:35 So how can people find you? And for listeners we’ll have that like always linked in the show description. Speaker 4 00:44:40 Great. Shannon Seeberan 00:44:42 so email is easy. Shannon at Cloud Med Spa. It’s plural. I can also you can also text me to set up a time to speak. My number is (773)Â 398-1999. Our website is a wealth of information cloud med spa.com. That’s one word with an S at the end. And yeah, reach out. Let’s schedule a time. happy to explain it. More. Specific to your market. Shannon Seeberan 00:45:10 Specific to your space. we want you to have full, a full understanding of how you can optimize this opportunity. Andrew Burdette 00:45:19 Cool. Well, I really appreciate you coming on. This is definitely a unique service from what I’m familiar with, and I’m kind of known as the systems guy, so I’m usually the guy that knows all the tech gizmos and software things that people would want to do. So this is a really cool little extra thing to add in, in a very kind of unique category on its own. so thanks for coming on. This has been really interesting. And, yeah. So thanks for being on. Shannon Seeberan 00:45:43 Thank you, I appreciate it. Thank you so much. Yep. Andrew Burdette 00:45:52 If you love this podcast, please be sure to rate and review. This podcast is designed to provide accurate and authoritative information in regards to the subject matter covered. It is given with the understanding that neither the host, the publisher or the guest are rendering legal, accounting, clinical or any other professional information. If you want professional, you should find one.