The Worthy Physician

Building Wealth in Medicine: A Conversation with Rocky Lalvani

• Dr. Sapna Shah-Haque MD

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In this episode of The Worthy Physician, host Dr. Sapna Shah-Haque speaks with finance expert Rocky Lalvani about the critical yet often neglected topic of financial literacy for physicians. They delve into the lack of financial education in medical training, the struggles of managing finances as a physician, and the importance of using strategies like compounding and smart investments to build wealth. Rocky shares valuable insights on overcoming business challenges, maintaining ethical practices, and leveraging one's skills to create profitable and fulfilling career paths in and out of traditional medical practice. Key takeaways include understanding the power of compounding, spending less than you earn, and exploring alternative methods such as concierge medicine and creating side businesses to achieve financial and personal freedom.

Topics Discussed:
• Overcoming money taboos in the medical field
• Delayed gratification and its impact on wealth
• Understanding and utilizing the compounding effect
• Budgeting and the importance of spending less than you earn
• Examining financial products targeting physicians
• Embracing a business mindset for financial success
• Recommended literature for financial understanding
• Making informed financial decisions and avoiding common pitfalls

Pattern Life:
https://affiliate.patternlife.com/theworthyphysician

Websites:

http://richersoul.com/

https://profitcomesfirst.com/


Social Media acct:

LinkedIn         - https://www.linkedin.com/in/rocky-lalvani/

Facebook       - https://www.facebook.com/richersoul

Instagram       - https://www.instagram.com/richer.soul/

Twitter            - https://twitter.com/rockylalvani

DISCLAIMER: THIS IS NOT FINANCIAL ADVICE.

For those eager to explore these ideas further, Lavani invites listeners to engage with his podcasts, Richer Soul and Profit Answer Man. These resources continue the conversation on achieving financial and personal fulfillment beyond professional success.

Stay connected with The Worthy Physician for more discussions that inspire, empower, and challenge the status quo. Remember to share this blog with fellow colleagues who might benefit

Though I am a physician, this is not medical advice. This is only a tool that physicians can use to get ideas on how to deal with burnout and/or know they are not alone. If you are in need of medical assistance talk to your physician.


Learn more about female physicians' journey through burnout to thriving!
https://www.theworthyphysician.com/books

Let's connect for speaking opportunities!
https://www.theworthyphysician.com/dr-shahhaque-md-as-a-speaker

Check out the free resources from The Worthy Physician:
https://www.theworthyphysician.com/freebie-downloads

Battle of the Boxes

21 Day Self Focus Journal

Dr. Shah-Haque:

Welcome episode with another episode with. Finances Physician., and I will be discussing your host, Sapna Sapna Shah-Haque, has a reigniting reigniting humanity humanity conversation passion. With medicine. each episode, you inspire stories, actionable insight, and expert advice. Get ready for another about change think and live as a physician. Your income is your greatest asset, Protected with .—the Life. easy, stress-free way to find the right disability insurance, With unbiased comparisons and helps patter helps you to choose the best policy for your needs. Secure your future today at Pattern Life. The link is in the show notes. Let's dive in. In medical school, how much did we learn about finance, and it's we'll-we'll whether it's do business? Today s finances Rocky Lalvani Welcome another episode of The Worthy Physician. I'm your host, Dr Sapna Shah- Haque, reigniting your humanity and passion for medicine. So, Rocky, thank you very much for being here. I've been excited about this conversation.

Rocky Lalvani:

As am I Actually, in medical school. If you talk about money, it's taboo, right? They kick you out almost.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

Oh yeah, Except for how much the tuition is going to cost you.

Rocky Lalvani:

Yeah, that's it's funny because health care is a business and it's unfortunate. It's what? 20 percent of our economy? Yeah, and it's expensive and there are so many factors there. And yet, as physicians, you're not taught the business of medicine and you get run by a bunch of MBAs and, let's face it, they don't teach compassion at MBA school school?

Dr. Shah-Haque:

No, because numbers don't need compassion, but people do, and that's we're getting right to it. That's where the crux is right. That's where the crux is. One complaint that I know that I have, and my colleagues have, is that we went into medical school to heal people, to be physicians and to make positive impacts in our community. And while there's a comfortable salary, we have to remember the return on investment is much slower than maybe other areas in life. But yes, we have a system where we have approximately 15 to 20 minute appointments. About 50% of that might be checking the patient in, and then we're left with maybe 10 minutes to discuss a lot of comorbidities, particularly I'm an internist, so it's going to be different for a cardiologist or a surgeon. Having said that, that does not leave any time for human connection and that's just like what we say here. It's just running people in and out like with a cattle prod.

Rocky Lalvani:

I was surprised you said you had that long.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

I'm in rural Kansas so I actually have longer.

Rocky Lalvani:

But in other places.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

Yeah, I'm not going to let everybody in on the secret of rural medicine. It's actually really beautiful and that's the reason why I'm still here.

Rocky Lalvani:

But I will say my primary care guy. He sit with me for 30 minutes if I needed it, but unfortunately he just got so angry at the system. He unfortunately had a heart attack in his 50s and that's not outside the norm, right? The stress of trying to run a private practice in a corporate world where you're getting hammered by the insurance company, you're getting hammered by competition, you're dealing with patients who may or may not be reasonable. It's not easy.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

No, it's not. It's not. Thank you for acknowledging that, but you have information for us today that can hopefully start to educate, and if the listener already has this prior knowledge, it can solidify, hammer it in or even make it more efficient. So, rocky, tell us about your background. How did you get into finance? How did you get into where you are today?

Rocky Lalvani:

So as a kid I always wanted to make money. I was always hustling as a kid, always making a buck. But back then you were taught go to college, get a good job. The problem is I got sick of school. So by the time I was done with high school I really didn't want to go to college. But I went because it was expected. I couldn't even imagine medical school because I would have banged my head against the wall. Plus, I'm not good at memorizing. I understand how this stuff is, but it's just not my thing. And so I got my degree in economics and I got out and I started working and I ended up in sales. That's where they were willing to pay me and so that's where I went.

Rocky Lalvani:

And then within a few years it's funny because it was all accidental I was selling to physicians. So way back in the day I actually sold dictation equipment. And so we go in, we teach physicians how to dictate, how to whip through their charts and put it into systems. And then I think back then the drug industry was really booming, so they were stealing all my reps. I was like, stop fighting the system and go where the money is. And so I ended up in the medical complex selling to physicians, but I always it was a struggle because if I didn't believe in what I was selling I wasn't going to push it, and I'd also have conversations like hey, do what's right for your patient. Back then information was gold. Back then you couldn't get on the internet and find articles. You couldn't see this stuff, and I remember back then, especially in teaching institutions, attendings weren't so nice at actually training. They were much better at whipping back in the day. This is prior to when they passed laws that said you couldn't stay up for 100 hours straight, and so I just had fun teaching and sharing and having great conversations. I was always around teaching institutions or with people who were doing that, so I very much enjoyed it. And when we were done talking about drugs, we started talking about money, because it would always amaze me how is it that physicians make so much but yet the stats show they actually didn't build wealth? And I came to realize through these conversations that you're not talked about money, that money is taboo, that all of these things don't happen In the biggest conversations.

Rocky Lalvani:

I would tell people as they left their residency fellowship is if you can stay behind the curve, you are guaranteed to wealth. If you get ahead of the curve, you're screwed. And I realized like you spend all that time in school. There is so much delayed gratification. You're getting out in your late 20s, maybe early 30s. All your friends who went on another path are living nice lives. You're still struggling and then all of a sudden they hand you a big paycheck and you run out and you buy the big house, the big car and you know all that pent up demand.

Rocky Lalvani:

But what I tell people is if you can just wait a couple of years now I'm not telling you to live like you did in training, but take a half a step, figure out. Is this really the geography I want to work in? Did they really tell me the truth when I took this opportunity or joined this practice? And once you get a little bit more settled and you're truly comfortable with where you are, then make the decisions to buy the super nice car and the super nice house. But just staying behind that curve actually allows you to get out of your debts and truly build wealth. It's all about compounding.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

Can you define that curve? I think I know what you're talking about, but can you define what the curve is?

Rocky Lalvani:

Yes. Let me ask you a simple question If you doubled a dollar for 31 days, how much money would you have?

Dr. Shah-Haque:

I'm old school, so I'd have to pull out a piece of paper, but you'd end up with a heck of a lot more than what you initially started with.

Rocky Lalvani:

Correct, you would end up with a little over a billion dollars. Okay, that's the power of compounding. Now what if you waited one day to start? How much would you lose? 20%. No, you'd lose the last double half a billion dollars. So think about this If you're coming out of your fellowship and instead of running out and spending all your money day one, if you just slowly started spending and slowly escalated your life and put the excess aside and let it build, you're guaranteed success because you all have good incomes. But if you don't do that, if you go oh, I'll do that in five years after I have fun you've literally given up a tremendous amount of wealth building and by overspending early, you sometimes get trapped in a house that three years later you're trying to get out of because you want to move somewhere, and maybe it's sellable, maybe it's not. It depends on the markets. All of these problems occur because you're trying to live the ego lifestyle that we've been told that you're supposed to live as a doctor and it's all BS.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

Thank you for those words, thank you, and I'm over here shaking my head because I rented for the first year where I reside now, actually bought the house, but rented for a first year just for those exact reasons. But everybody's you're supposed to have, you're a doctor, you're supposed to have this million dollar house. And let's put it in perspective a million dollar house in kansas is going to be a mcmahon huge, where a million dollar house and on the east coast or west coast is going to be tiny, having said that, which one's going to sell easier, and it's goingdollar house on the East Coast or West Coast is going to be tiny, having said that, which one's going to sell easier, and it's going to be on the coast, not here in the Midwest.

Rocky Lalvani:

In the Midwest. You might never get out of that.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

You're going to be locked in for life, and probably a couple generations would be my guess. But the whole idea is you have to buy smart.

Rocky Lalvani:

You do. And again, these aren't the things that are talked about. And even on the I guess it really depends it's still hard to say. Even if you can sell the million dollar home the cost of moving in, decorating, undecorating, moving again selling you end up behind the curve over those three years and you have nothing to show for it, whereas you know what I'm all about.

Rocky Lalvani:

Going out and renting Go rent the $750,000 house. You'd be shocked at how much cheaper it is. And then you don't feel the need to redecorate it because you're only going to be there a couple of years until you settle. And once you're settled, then go be extravagant. But at that point you've built up a massive down payment, you've built up the ability to do that, and I know they have these physician loans. Do the math. Yes, you don't need a down payment, but guess what? You're paying a higher interest rate. Right, and you're paying, especially in today's world, like when interest rates were 2%, 3%, who cared? But with today's mortgage rates, you'd be shocked at what the differentials are. And so you just got to do the math and see Compounding works both ways it works up and it works down. The downside is called debt, the upside is called wealth. You choose.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

So that curve is what? How do we define that curve? Sorry, I got distracted from my original question.

Rocky Lalvani:

It's kind of like a hockey stick. It's like an airplane taking off. Have you ever been in an airplane? Think of an airplane going to medical school. You get off, they go hey, we're going to medical school. You turn onto the runway. Right At this point the engines are full blast.

Rocky Lalvani:

You're sitting there still. All of a sudden you let go of the brakes. Now you're starting to move and you're going down this runway and everything's full speed ahead. Right, you look out the window. You're like wait a minute, I'm still on the ground. We're slowly picking up momentum and even at some point you're doing 100 miles an hour. You're still on the ground, the plane's shaking, you're revving all of this energy and you're like am I really getting anywhere?

Rocky Lalvani:

But within moments you get done with medical school, you get done with your fellowship. The plane takes off and now you're soaring and that is what the curve will do. It's a J curve in business, it's a compounding curve. It all follows that and if you're smart, you can adjust how quickly the curve works to your advantage. And again, if you delay, like we talked about, if you wait one day, you lose a lot. So if you start changing specialties or if you don't actually start your compounding because you want to go live life for the next five or seven years, then you only have so long to work right. Most of your time is in education. You've got a short window where you're young and vital and, depending on what you're doing, it really depends what your longevity in the profession is.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

All excellent points. So how do we, or how does one use compounding to their advantage? What are some strategies there? Because what we're taught for retirement and going back to the house, making a good choice to have that be an investment instead of a liability, which that's debatable. But how do we? What are some other? How do we choose those right vehicles for building that compound in our favor?

Rocky Lalvani:

The first thing I have to tell you is you are a target. You are a target for the financial industry because they know two things. They know you make lots of money and they know you've never been taught about money and so you are a sucker for them, and that is the way they're going to treat you. Be very careful. What you get involved in. There are just simple basic strategies that you can follow to build wealth. At the end of the day, it doesn't matter whether you're in business or in your personal life. These principles are the same. You have got to spend less than what comes in the door, and the bigger the gap between how much that comes in and how much it goes out, you mine that gap. And the bigger you can make the gap, the faster your curve starts and the faster your curve builds.

Rocky Lalvani:

Understand something If you're a doctor and you're making half a million dollars a year and you're living on half a million dollars a year, I guarantee you are no happier or more upset than the guy next to you who's making half a million dollars a year and only spending 300,000. The S-Class or the 7 Series is wonderful on day one, I can tell you. On day 365, you still have the payment and there's a new one and now all the joy is gone from it and it doesn't matter. But and I'm not telling you not to buy these things, I'm saying you, do them in time and if you can separate the curve further and further, you'll be able to pay cash for them. It won't even be a hassle because your money will start making money for you. But you've got to start the process and be able to do that.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

So what I'm hearing is try to minimize the excessive spending and pay yourself first in order to build that wealth. Whatever category the individual chooses, but be smart about it. Educate yourself on your options and pick what's right for you.

Rocky Lalvani:

Correct and don't get all. There is a ton of hype and there's a ton of FOMO. It's all BS, it really is. And a lot of the people selling you stuff to save, especially in the world of tax savings, oh, get involved in this infinite banking or whatever crazy scheme they're talking about. If you actually do the math, you will realize the only person getting wealthy is them, not you. But most people don't do the math and that's the problem. They get or they go. Oh, it's a tax deduction, and because you're in a high tax bracket, you think that what good is a tax deduction that saves you 40% if you lose 100%? Right, it's not, it's zero. So be very careful of what you're getting involved in. Look at the total picture. What are the fees involved in this structure? What flexibility do I have? Is this like a marriage? Some of these products are like marriages Till death. Do we part? I don't like that. Life changes and so make sure what you're getting involved in.

Rocky Lalvani:

The other thing is just understanding the business of business, and here's the dirty little secret Most business owners. They don't understand their finances either. It's very rare to have somebody just in general, even in the business world, who understands their finances and how to be profitable. I have an MBA. They didn't teach us how to be profitable. They didn't teach us how to do all these things. It is somewhat of a rare skill that it's surprising that it's not more well-known. It really is, and I think that's why so many people in the medical industry also have to deal with it, and hospitals have, and their systems have their own incentives of what they have to do. And when you start realizing the incentives, you realize why we're in the mess we are today because the incentives don't actually meet what we truly need. And so there's ways out of this and we talked about I think most people understand the 80-20 rule. 20% of what you do produces 80% of the results. So you have to ask yourself how do I play the 80-20 rule in medicine? And you may or not agree with this, but getting out of contracts where they dictate your prices is how you play the 80-20s.

Rocky Lalvani:

Medicare in many cases barely pays enough to cover what you're doing. What if you don't take Medicare right? You're like, then I'll lose 80% of my business? Yes, you will, but the 20% you have will actually generate so much revenue and you won't have all this staff and you won't have all this overhead and you won't have all this craziness overhead. You won't have all this craziness. And wouldn't it be nice to work 20% and still have the same take-home pay? Concierge medicine is another way to do this, or just getting out of the whole.

Rocky Lalvani:

We don't have a healthcare system right. We have a sick care system. Getting out of the sick care system and getting into a healthcare system people will pay you. We spend billions on supplements on this, on that. Learning how to figure out how to build a business model around actually keeping people healthy is profitable, and today, I think more than ever, you are seeing at the cutting edge.

Rocky Lalvani:

There is so much more talk about preventative health care and doing that type of stuff instead of following the traditional path. So I'm healthy. I'm in my late 50s. I just got a full body MRI. I want to make sure there's nothing missing. I'm sitting down having conversations about longevity, about what do I do at 50 so that I can run at 80. And in all of these things, I'm finding healthcare. It's hard to even find a healthcare provider who's going to sit down and talk about the longevity benefits of rapamycin, or does metformin help or not help? Or let's look at things very differently. Let's have an hour long conversation and I'll pay for that. I don't mind, there's lots of people who will.

Rocky Lalvani:

You've got to figure out how to get out of the system and how to stop doing stuff that isn't viable. And if you're working for somebody, let's face it, you're an employee and I've seen over my 30 years all that's happened is you get paid less and less, you work harder and harder and now they whip you after residency and that's not fair. But I think it's understanding that you can walk away, and one of those ways is to create your own business and figure it out. And then the same thing in business, you've got to put profit first. You've got to understand your motivators. You've got to understand hey, where are the opportunities in the business world where I have the opportunity to make money without killing myself? And that's a big part of it and that's what we help our business owners to do is to understand where are these opportunities and to do it ethically, because I think there is so much unethical stuff in these side areas and I'm not at all promoting that.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

Thank you for mentioning that because I think, yeah, ethics. We live in a world where ethics has really been tossed aside. Now there are these pop-up clinics and these little boutiques and they're really those overnight shops and that's not what many of us went to medical school for and again, I'm for profit making. That's just the way life is. Whether we like it or not, that's part of life. Having said that, we need to do it ethically. I love how you framed and I think this takes a mind shift for physicians but looking for those opportunities within the business world, that's a very powerful statement and also intimidating at the same time, because many physicians don't feel comfortable in the business world. So what's the first step in getting comfortable world?

Rocky Lalvani:

So what's the first step in getting comfortable? What is it? Why aren't they comfortable? What is?

Dr. Shah-Haque:

it. That's making them uncomfortable. I would say and I'm just making a blanket statement, I'm not again. We don't have that training in medical school about finances. It's a different language and oh my gosh.

Rocky Lalvani:

I might not know everything. Okay, number one, you're never going to know everything. I can tell you this you get three good business books. You're smart enough to figure it out. It really doesn't take more than that.

Rocky Lalvani:

Everyone tries to make everything complicated. Doesn't take more than that. Everyone tries to make everything complicated. Everything is actually much simpler than you can imagine. As a matter of fact, when I'm looking at all these different longevity things and all these different ways of living healthier, there are two things at the underpinning of everything, and they're both simple. It's called diet and exercise. Everyone says diet and exercise, but who's actually like? What I was taught about diet in college is BS. What the government's got about diet is BS. And yet if you just follow these simple, easy to do principles, it works. Money is no different. Like here is the principle for money Spend less than you earn. That's it. You follow that and you widen the gap. You will become wealthy In business.

Rocky Lalvani:

It's a couple of things. The first thing I think business exists for this simple reason. People have a problem and they want a solution. Okay, when people come into your office, some might, because they've been a little bit educated, but they don't care how you fix their problem. They're like, doc, I've got a problem, fix me Right. They're not so worried about how, they just want the end result, that I feel better. Business is the same exact thing. I have a problem, I want a solution. I don't care about your mechanism. But here's where most business owners get it wrong. They get so in love with their mechanism and they talk about their mechanism and all the features and benefits and how wonderful it is and everyone's. I don't care. And in that it's just a slight, subtle shift.

Rocky Lalvani:

Find the problem, find the solution, and you don't even have to do the work right, you can just hire other physicians or somebody to go be the solution part of it. Hire other physicians or somebody to go be the solution part of it, and you take a cut on the whole thing. That's truly what business is all about. And then it's all about systems and processes. And it's funny because I think the medical world you're probably getting better. I love going back to the airplane story. Right, every pilot has a checklist, we have systems and processes. If the plane crashes, we investigate forever and then we make sure we never do that again. The medical world's getting better about that. But nobody wants to do this because everyone's worried about getting sued. But in business, create systems and processes to be able to deliver what it is that you need to deliver that truly meets people's needs, and you'd be shocked at how easy business becomes. But I think more often what happens is we keep throwing money at the problem and we expect the money to solve it, and it will not.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

Right. We actually need people to think this through. That's what I love about being a physician and the fact that we're natural problem solvers Every person that comes through the clinic. They might have the same diagnoses, but the socioeconomic barriers or support are going to be different. The medications that we can use for person A might be different than person B, depending on comorbidities, other medications as well as allergies. So we have to remember how resourceful we are and how well we can communicate, and I think that those skills are very translatable to what you're describing. I think it's just very daunting. We overthink it.

Rocky Lalvani:

You do, and so this is what I think you get stuck because you went to school to be a doctor and you don't realize that those skills are massively transferable. Yeah, the ability to learn, the ability to critically think, the ability to diagnose a problem, the ability to have the confidence to deliver it, even though, when you know, I don't know if this is going to work right, and yet you'll trial and error and those are those skills that are transferable to business. And if the biggest thing, though, I tell people, is if you can build your nest egg, then it becomes easy to do the rest. So if you're making half a million bucks a year and you're living on two to fifty and you're putting money aside, within a few years you've got enough of a runway to go try something else out. And what's the worst that happens you go back to medicine or you figure out a side shoot of medicine where you have the ability to do things. It's a shame that the industry has changed so much that many of you got purchased out, and that was the old generation selling out. They got their paycheck, they ran, and now the systems are controlling how referrals go through, and people want a real person to be their doctor.

Rocky Lalvani:

I don't want to see a different physician every time I walk into my medicine clinic, and so I think there is a ton of demand for good health care. You just got to find a way to make it work within your market, your skill sets and what the payer mix is. Or you go to cash and people will pay, and I think that the key there is if you go to cash and you don't have to do all the things that you're supposed to do, how much more time would you have to actually deliver health care? A lot more. It amazes me that they actually don't give every physician a support staff that stands right next to them in the room filling out the computer, doing all the stuff, and literally you could be 10x more efficient if you just had a person next to you who took care of all this minutiae and you could focus on what you needed to focus on. I don't understand why that is not the norm in medicine cost. It's not. It's actually not. This comes back to the 80 20 rule, right, if I've got a 20 minute thing and I'm spending all my time in the computer and something I can't focus on truly what I'm getting paid to do. But if you had all that information brought to you immediately ready to roll, you could technically, you could see more people. You could focus more on dealing with that.

Rocky Lalvani:

It's an efficiency, and people don't measure inefficiency. They don't understand the loss. The same thing, when I ask you the question about the compounding what if you wait a day? Nobody measures how much they lose if they wait a day. They don't think about the half a billion dollars, they think about the dollar. They can't see that inefficiency is killing them. And in business it is all about understanding efficiencies. That's why McDonald's is so successful. They are extremely efficient. They are extremely standardized. Anybody can do that. What you're getting it's consistent, reproducible results, and I think the same thing can happen in other parts of medicine. The problem is you've got so much I don't even know what you call it around you that you've got to deal with. That's just absurdity instead of truly focusing on what's important. And that's the problem you have to deal with. And the other big problem is you have to deal with insurance companies and so you spend half your time fighting with them and filling out their forms and doing all that craziness.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

Now you hit the nail on the head and that's what I think what makes a concierge so attractive, because you gain back your autonomy and all the problem solving and the minutiae is minimized. And if I want to go hire a scribe, then, or even the software there's AI software now that can do that so it takes away that person's sick. You're still going to if the AI doesn't get sick, so you're still going to show up and perform. But I think there are multiple thoughts.

Rocky Lalvani:

You don't have to walk away to do this. I think it's that first step. So think about it. If you did locum for a while, you work a few days a week and you build a practice on the side or you do, in other words, figure out how you can free up your time to be able to do what you want, and so there are a million ways to do it. If you actually think about it, I'm sure you will find a way that you can still generate income working for somebody while building something on the side, and I think that's a big part of it. Or look at the medical system and say what are my biggest hassles? How do I solve them? And go solve them and sell that, like that alone would make billions.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

No, I really appreciate this conversation. For me it's very invigorating. I hope it's for the listeners as well, because, again, these are not topics that we dive into in medical school, but they are. We are capable of doing that. We are able to transfer those skills and if this is sitting well with anybody, go sit down and put this on replay, listen to these pearls and really just start sketching that out.

Rocky Lalvani:

Create some white space and let those thought processes start flowing rocky if literally the key, create the space, shut off the noise, have a handful of questions and just start that journey to figure it out and see what you can do. But you really need a big part of what you need is thinking time and I think for many of you're just bound up from work. Get thinking time, yeah Right.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

And for the listener, if it's okay. I don't know where to start. How do they find that starting point?

Rocky Lalvani:

I think the first starting point is to sit down and look at yourself and say what do I want At the end of the day? What do I want At the end of the day? What do I want from life? What do I want my life to look like? Is there a particular area you want to live in? Is there a particular schedule you want to have? What are your skill sets and what are you really good at? And then start to say, ok, this is me, this is what I want, and then just start looking at opportunities. It's not to say you're going to do anything, but just start thinking what about this and what about that? Investigate, concierge, investigate hey, what are the biggest problems we see all day? Is there a way I could solve these problems that the market would accept? Just take the time to start thinking through it. Maybe there's a health care revolution that you could possibly do, maybe it's, I don't. You just got to slow down and think is really what it comes down to, and I don't want to put people into a box or a pack. There is no. There's no one size fits all. I think it's really sitting down for you and figuring it out, but regardless of what you want to do.

Rocky Lalvani:

The number one thing start spending less than you earn so you can create access. And when you have access, you have freedom. And when you have freedom, you can make choices. And that's really what this is. It's not about the money, it's about the freedom to be able to say screw you, I quit and walk away and go do what you want. And figure out what that is. And it is not a straight line. I will tell you because I deal with business owners all day long. It is a roller coaster. Okay, it is up and down. Nothing's perfect. Things always go wrong. They take four times as long as they're expected, they cost twice as much as expected and, just like you have to deal with all the people in the hospital and the people who don't do their job. Welcome to the world of business. It's the same crap, different place.

Rocky Lalvani:

So it's just life right? Yeah, you got to figure out how do I build it for me with my skill sets, my love. Here's the thing If you're doing what you love, you are naturally going to kick everyone else's ass because for other people it's drudgery. If you love doing it and you focus on it and you work at it, then you're the one who's going to just naturally grow beyond everyone else, because you're doing it out of love and you're interesting. Your thought process.

Rocky Lalvani:

And the other thing is I was just reading an article this morning about the guy. He's in Taiwan. They are the biggest chip maker in the world. Yeah, okay, he started his company when he was 55. Right, so age is not like the limiting factor. As a matter of fact, he said the only reason I could do this is because I was 55, because I had so much experience and knowledge that I could see the problems and I could see solutions that a 20 year old couldn't see or a 30 year old couldn't see, and because I had the knowledge, I knew how to make it happen.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

That's beautiful and it's not about age. It's exactly what you have just outlined. I have three more questions for you, okay. First off is what about? Oh my gosh, I'm going to put myself out there, and what if I fail? For physicians, we don't take failure very well, because we can't fail. We can't fail because that's how we got into medical school and residency and fellowship and, damn it, that's how we're attending.

Rocky Lalvani:

You all deal with life and death. Yeah, what are the regrets of the dying? Not trying, yes, yes, there you go. Okay, I will tell you something Not trying is a bigger failure than failing. You're smart enough to figure your way out through failure. Hey, that experiment didn't work. Oh, I learned one thing I'm not going to do again. That's it. That's my advice for that.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

I love it. That's my advice, for that. I love it. I'm over here smiling because you're speaking to my soul. You're speaking to my soul and if you're caught up in that, it's ego. Let's put that aside and just try something new yeah, I did.

Rocky Lalvani:

I walked away from that whole industry and I started my own business. So I get it. I'll never look back. I don't care what the check is they offer me, I will never go back and that's important to know that boundaries, boundaries and sticking to your ethics. Going back to ethics, I reverse engineered my business based on the skills I had back when I was 14, 15 years old, and so I just didn't realize how valuable they were. Everything else was noise in between.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

Yeah, what are the top three books that you would recommend for a physician if they wanted to learn the basics of business?

Rocky Lalvani:

So I love Profit First. That's what I do. I help people with Profit First. The thing with Profit First, though, is if you haven't started a business, it doesn't resonate because you haven't experienced the problem and you just don't get it. You haven't experienced the problem and you just don't get it. But profit first is basically basic business finance. Now, if you start with profit first, you can at least do your plan out to say this is how I'm going to be profitable, and you should at least think with that in mind, like when am I going to take my cash up?

Rocky Lalvani:

My other favorite book is the Road Less Stupid. You can make a lot of mistakes. You can learn from others. Keith Cunningham is phenomenal about teaching you how to think, and so, even in the Road Less Stupid, you can read that book as a physician working in a system and pick out questions for thinking about your current situation or how to make it better. And that's the other thing. As a physician, why not get into administration and just clobber the MBAs? You're 10 times smarter than them. Seriously, that's another path that you know is also possible. They really don't understand numbers as much as you think they do. So those are two.

Rocky Lalvani:

What's a third business. I think it really depends on where they are in their business journey. I'd almost say almost, to look at a psychology book to learn how to overcome yourself and how to do something along those. But I'm trying to think off the top of what's a good one and I'm not totally sure. But I think you have to deal with your own psychology and your own interference, because the number one thing that is going to prevent you from success is the reflection in the mirror. And so you got to overcome that.

Rocky Lalvani:

And I'm starting to think, maybe something from Michael Singer. And actually if you read Michael Singer's story, it's phenomenal how this hippie guy you know who's, you know, breathing and living in a little shack somewhere started a I think it was at least a hundred million or a billion dollar medical record processing company. Here he is, he built this company. Ray Kurzweil was on his board. They sold out and I forget what it turned into, but they were actually the first people doing a lot of the medical processing for physicians and for physician practices and so forth. So something from there. At the end of the day, you got to overcome yourself.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

Yeah, no, thank you for that, because it's just a good, simple way to get started and to get those thoughts flowing, maybe helping with that mind shift. And what is one last pearl of wisdom you would like to leave with us today?

Rocky Lalvani:

So remember I told you the whole concept of compounding Dollar doubled for 31 days is a billion dollars. You wait till tomorrow, it's a half a billion. You wait till the next day, it's a quarter of a million. Quarter 250 million. You wait till the next day, you're down to $100 million. So you're one-tenth of what you could have had.

Rocky Lalvani:

I wasted a good amount of my life not starting, not figuring it out, not doing it. Just start. I'm not telling you to quit your job or quit your business, but start systematically building something on the side. For years I constantly had this thing that was sitting on the back of my burner, that I was stirring and working through a little by little and actually incorporated into my day-to-day life and into my day-to-day business of what I used to do. But that backburner simmering allowed me to build and escape and walk away to doing what I want. But you got to take the first step. You don't take the first step, you get nothing. You will continue to do what you want and then you'll be one of those people who, at the end of their life, is going the regrets I have.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

I'd rather regret failing than not trying.

Rocky Lalvani:

It's called the practice of medicine.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

It's called the practice of medicine, Every patient. It's the practice.

Rocky Lalvani:

Wait a minute. You mean you're not experts in medicine, you're still practicing Seriously.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

Yeah, we forget about that. We forget about that. Let's try this medication for your A1C or your hypertension or urinary issues, and let's see how you're doing in three to six months. It's the same concept.

Rocky Lalvani:

It is Go experiment yeah.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

Well, Rocky, thank you so much. And if the listener wants to reach out to you, how do we do that?

Rocky Lalvani:

So, before they do that, a couple of favors to ask If you enjoy this show, do me a favor, hit the like button wherever you're listening. It's a nice way to say thank you to Sapna. All right, if you know another physician who needs to listen to this episode, share right, start a conversation, because if you're stuck in your head, maybe two or three of you having this conversation can figure something out together. And then after that, if you want to come find me. I have two podcasts. The first one is called Rich or Salt. The tagline is you got rich, now what? Because money isn't going to make you happy. The other one is Profit Answer man, where we show you how to run a more profitable business. Whatever one resonates with you, come listen to it, check it out. Business Whatever one resonates with you, come listen to it, check it out. This is what we do all day.

Dr. Shah-Haque:

We share excellent advice. Thank you, and those links will be in the show notes Again,