Activate Your Practice Podcast
The Activate Your Practice Podcast is hosted by the Chairman & Founder of Activator Methods, Dr. Arlan Fuhr. This podcast will cover a variety of subjects. Dr. Fuhr will interview guests from different backgrounds and professions, as well as talk about his 50+ years in chiropractic care.
Activate Your Practice Podcast
Dr. Fuhr & Dr. Fab Discuss the Importance of Mentorship When Growing a Practice
Unlock the secrets to a thriving career in chiropractic with invaluable wisdom from two of the industry's most influential leaders. Join Dr. Arlan Fuhr, founder and chairman of Activator Methods International, and Dr. Fab Mancini, former president of Parker College, as they share heartfelt stories and practical advice on the power of mentorship and achieving success in chiropractic. Through intimate anecdotes, Dr. Mancini reveals how mentors like Dr. James W. Parker saw potential in him that he couldn't see himself, propelling him to remarkable heights. Dr. Fuhr complements these insights by recounting his own experiences mentoring young professionals, demonstrating the profound impact that guidance and belief can have on one's journey.
Learn practical steps to build a sustainable and fulfilling chiropractic practice as Dr. Fuhr discusses his extensive journey of visiting 62 practices before fully committing to the profession. Discover how managing finances wisely, starting with minimal overhead, and prioritizing patient care can set new graduates on the path to success. This episode is a treasure trove of advice, emphasizing proficiency in adjusting over expensive equipment and showcasing how continual learning and exposure to successful practices can expand your belief system. Don’t miss this chance to gain insights from two visionaries who have helped shape the chiropractic profession.
Hi, I'm Dr Arlen Foer, the chairman and founder of Activator Methods International. Welcome to Activate your Practice podcast. Today I have a celebrity with me, dr Fab Mancini, who I go way back with. He started at Parker, became the president of Parker College. He's now into mentoring and a system for really successful people and he has a hundred people that come to his mentor conferences and he charges them. You know, it's like about $25,000 for a person and I wanted to talk today to him because he knows about mentoring and I remember being at one of your conferences Fab and I was sitting in the back and Fab got up and he said I want you to meet my mentor. And he said, dr Four, are you in the back there? And I said, yes, I wasn't even thinking.
Speaker 1:I was thinking of being a friend, not a mentor, but welcome.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much and thanks for this opportunity To me. When I think of the word mentoring, I think of my first professional mentor, I would say was Dr James W Parker, and I'll never forget that Dr Jim came to after one of the assemblies that we used to have, came to after one of the assemblies that we used to have. I would always sit front row and after the second assembly he came to me and said I want to get to know you better and all of a sudden he started mentoring me without me even asking. And this is what I learned about a mentor. A mentor will come to you if they feel your hunger, if they feel your desire to want to become or be something better or greater than you're currently being. I never asked Dr Parker to mentor me, but one day, many years later, I asked him why me? Why not your own kids? Why not your grandkids? And he said to me because you remind me of myself when I was your age. And he said that BJ Palmer was his mentor and when he went to school, bj would do what he did with me. He would share stories of the past, he would teach me lessons, and what I learned about that is, that he saw in me what I couldn't see in myself as a young student. And that's what a good mentor does. A good mentor sees in the person something so much greater than we're currently seeing and then shows us how that's possible.
Speaker 2:Now Dr Parker would tell me one day, you're going to be president of Parker. And I said oh no, dr Parker, that's not for me. And I said they said oh no. He said you're going to be the next president of Parker, and I said no, that's not for me. And then I realized that he only charged a school a dollar a year to be president. So I thought that that's what the job paid. And then, number two, he was in his seventies and I'm like maybe when I'm 60 is what I would tell him. And then little did I know that a few years later I was actually going to be asked to be president of Parker University and be in that role for over 13 years. So he saw something in me that I couldn't see myself, and that belief that he had for me is the belief that I had to tap into, to get out of my comfort zone and want to be something greater, and that's what a good mentor really does.
Speaker 1:You know that's exactly right, and I can give an example. Our chief operating officer and activator is 28 years old and his father worked for us and he had a heart attack at 54 and passed away. And his mother left Phoenix Arizona and went to live with her children and kicked this kid out on the street and my wife, judy, said we can't leave him out there. So we went and got him an apartment and we got him clothes. We did everything, we done everything but signed the adoption papers for him and he said I want to be in my dad's job one day.
Speaker 1:Now, 10 years later, he's doing his father's job, and even better. And he came to us and said oh, I also want to be a millionaire. And I said well, listen to us then. And Judy took him under her wing and said here's how you did banking accounts, here's how you do savings accounts, here's your 401k. He saved in 10 years living with another employee for $400 a month $80,000, in which he bought a house back when the interest rates were 2%, and so those kinds of things. If kids are really interested, they can be mentored, and so I completely understand where you're going. Now let me ask you this now, as you've grown, have you still had mentors?
Speaker 2:Yes. So it's interesting because what I've learned is that a mentor sometimes it's not one person only. I have many different mentors. I have John Gray. He's my mentor for my relationships. He wrote the book Men Are for Mars, women Are for Venus. He's probably the best relationship expert that I know.
Speaker 2:For television, I have Dr Phil as my mentor. I've been doing media for a long time. He's my mentor. He shows me and shares with me what he's discovered with me, what he's discovered for my understanding about agreements. I have Don Miguel Ruiz. He wrote the Four Agreements.
Speaker 2:He's my mentor whenever I feel like I'm not keeping up with my word, because he wrote the book the Four Agreements and part of that book taught me that unless you have agreements with yourself, it's very difficult to really build a life of integrity. So, anyway. So I find that there's different mentors out there that have taught me different things that I was not or I have not surpassed. So a good mentor is somebody that, or a good person is somebody that identifies an area in their life that they feel they can do better. Like I'll never forget, I was very privileged to be able to be in a room where I met Alex Rodriguez from the New York Yankees, and I never forget Alex telling me that he never was taught how to manage money by any of his managers, agents, friends, etc. Until he met Warren Buffett. And once he met Warren Buffett, he understood the responsibility of money to the degree that he could manage it better and therefore made him one of the wealthiest sportspersons that we've ever had. And he became best friends with Warren because he was so hungry in wanting to manage his money well that Warren saw himself in him and actually gave him. Even though he doesn't come from a financial background, he gave him the information that Warren had learned after many years of investing.
Speaker 2:So I believe that we need to identify the areas that we can improve, and I think we need to start looking at who in our lives and many times we just attract those people in our lives can help me surpass this, improve this, maybe speed up the process that I can get there sooner than later, and that's what a good mentor does.
Speaker 2:But then I also believe there's another side to mentorship that a lot of people do not pay attention to is, once you master an area of your life whether it's your business life, personal life then it's important that we have the responsibility to pass it on to those around us and be open to seeing mentioned to me that you know they wanted to pay me to mentor them.
Speaker 2:That I accepted and that's where my mentorship grew, and this was almost eight years ago, and now it's over a hundred CEOs and some of the most successful providers in the, because I open myself to give them of myself something that I'm not using anymore but that they can definitely benefit from. You know, like Warren Buffett is already wealthy enough. He doesn't need to take the time to teach Alex how to do investing Right investing right but he did it because he knows Alex is going to impact a lot of other athletes that are seeing him as an example and say I don't want to be a broke athlete after I end my season, you know, or my career. Look at this man he's getting richer the longer he away he is from playing. I want to be like him and that's why he did it when I first moved to Phoenix.
Speaker 1:Charles Barkley lived down the street four houses and he was you know. He was a character to start with, but in the complex that we lived in he was a really nice guy and I saw him take basketball players that did not know how to handle money and he would take them into his house and he would say first thing you're buying is a house and you're paying cash for it, so you'll have a place to live when you do the rest away. And I watched him mentor and I had the opportunity. Also, I met a guy in church and he was a retired captain in the Navy and he was also just one. He was into astrology and he was into all kinds of stuff. And Harry became my mentor. He was 92 when we started and he passed away about three years into our mentorship. But he left with me all kinds of things that I needed to do to get where I wanted.
Speaker 1:For example, we were thinking about going on a safari in Africa, but I was talking myself out of it because I didn't want to get shots and stuff like that. But we found out later. You didn't have to have many way going to Tanzania, but Harry said one day you will wish you had taken the trip. He was 100% right, the trip was fabulous. And we got back and I thanked Harry forever for doing that and he was in, finally got tied to his bed because he just couldn't get around.
Speaker 1:But he had a computer and he said the other thing you have to do, arlo, is start a guest list and a friends list. So I had 20 people on my friends list. I thought I was a big deal. Harry died and his daughter forgot to do it correctly. So all of his list came out to us. He had 331 friends on his guest list and it ranged from people in astronomy to people in the Navy, to church people it was all over the map. But he had a method of communicating until he passed away. So what do you recommend to kids coming out of school today? How do you see them tying on to somebody?
Speaker 2:Well, one of the things that I discover, even in my own journey, is we have to be very clear in what Stephen Covey used to talk about. What is having the end in mind? What is it that I see myself accomplishing as a doctor of chiropractic in this world? You have been a mentor to so many people like me over the years, where you've inspired other people to want to maybe develop a technique, maybe be better researchers, maybe be better communicators or better adjusters. Like me, you taught me one of the greatest lessons that I thought I learned in chiropractic and that is to always deliver a very specific and good adjustment right. There's a lot of people out there that come in chiropractic and they just want to adjust everything that can move. But we find and you taught us that through your technique for many years that sometimes just adjusting the majors can take care of the minors and if you give a very specific adjustment which your research proves that day in and day out, you actually have a better outcome, clinical outcome on that patient. So right now I would say to a young person graduating this number one be clear about what you want to be. 20 years, 30 years later, have that in mind.
Speaker 2:Number two visit as many successful practices as you can possibly can. I visited 62 practices before I chose to become a chiropractor. Now I visit over thousands of practices ever since, because I have seen doctors of chiropractic practice in a town where they're making $10 million and I've seen down the street somebody that's saying that they can even barely make a hundred thousand dollars in the same city with the same skills, with the same training, and the only difference is their belief system of what is possible, if I apply myself. So visiting successful chiropractors will allow you to expand that belief system, to realize how big this profession can really be. And then, thirdly, I would say learn to manage your money well.
Speaker 2:Don't go out there thinking that you have to buy everything in order to be successful. I never forget that I started in a executive suite paying $250 a month, $100 for the phone, with a portable table that I had in school, with an old computer my little brother gave me, with an old floppy disk that I bought $99 from I forget the name of the company that I could actually be electronic from day one, and one of the things that I realized is be electronic from day one, and one of the things that I realized is that patients don't come to you because how beautiful everything is. They come to you because they need help. And if you are proficient with your adjusting and you know that you can help this person get well, you're always going to succeed.
Speaker 2:The problem is many kids are already graduating with some debt. Then they get deeper in debt by going into leasing everything they can possibly imagine and by the end of the day, they're spending 80 to 90 percent of their overhead paying everybody else before they pay themselves that 10 percent. We need to keep our overheads under 50 percent If you can get under 30, even better and we need to be careful not to put our self-worth based on equipment and things, but to put it in our skill sets, put it in our knowledge and, more importantly, in our desire to help people. And that will be the advice that I will give anybody that's graduating right now.
Speaker 1:Well, I can't thank you enough, because you've had a lot of experience and you've been very successful, and so, thank you, dr Fabrizio Mancini. You've not only been a, you know, somebody that I'd like to be around, but a good friend in all different situations. Thank you.
Speaker 2:Well, thank you, arlen, and God bless you, and thank you for always inspiring us to be better.
Speaker 1:Thanks.
