NSU CDM Impressions Fall/Winter 2019

NOVA SOUTHEASTERN UNIVERSITY | 9 Sharpening Your Business Acumen DI D YOU KNOW? • You can earn a D.M.D./M.B.A. dual degree from NSU, which will arm you with management principles to pursue your own private practice. • NSU can also help you learn to navigate legal and financial aspects of entrepreneurship with evening classes leading to a certificate. • An Introductory to Entrepreneurship course is also available. • NSU’s H. Wayne Huizenga College of Business and Entrepreneurship offers additional courses illustrating - how to get a business up and running - business law - employment law - real estate law (Some information from Dental Economics magazine) TWO TI PS FROM TWOROGER BY TOM TWOROGER, D.B.A., PROFESSOR AND CHAIR OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP AT THE HUIZENGA COLLEGE OF BUSINESS • It’s good for dentists to have business law and employment law under their belts, so they don’t have to call an attorney each time they have to sign a contract or negotiate a lease for equipment, for instance. • Those going into private dental practice should want to own their property and lease it back to their business. If, someday, they’d like to sell that practice, they can lease the property to the new owner. And then, someday, they sell the property. Now, they’ve sold their business twice. She read Facebook groups and listened to podcasts about the downside of taking over an existing office. Although these came with a client base, it took time for an office to switch gears. “The patients and the staff members are used to it running one way, and that takes time to change,” she said. After commissioning a demographic study to figure out who their ideal patient was, and the groups of patients they wanted, the couple narrowed down their patient population. “Where was the growth? We wanted to be near Fort Lauderdale, but if you go down Commercial Boulevard, there is a dentist on every corner. We wanted to be away from that,” Hart said. They found an “empty shell of a building” in an up-and-coming location in Oakland Park. “The city really wants to invest in this area. They have been extremely helpful in getting our name out,” said Cundy Hart. Their practice, Hart to Hart Dental, opened in June 2019. The space they found has a vacancy next door. As their practice grows, they are hoping to have combined, but separate, offices. “Our unique feature will be to basically have two practices under one roof. For patients who are just coming for general dentistry, they come in on the side where we are now. The children and a family could come in the other side. And the adults and kids could be seen at the same time,” Hart said. Currently, the office offers pediatrics on Monday, Wednesday, and half days on Friday and general dentistry on Tuesday and Thursday. They share a dental assistant and a front office administrator for now. “Everyone, including us, wears a lot of hats,” Hart said. COMMON GOALS Despite these alumni’s different experiences opening their own businesses, they all share common goals— to thrive through autonomy, with the result being best practices in patient care. They agree that their higher education at NSU CDM taught them how to be the best in their field, and the real world was where they learned the basics of dental economics. u