Imagine this. You're in the heart of Chicago
mingling with the brightest minds in health IT.
You've arrived at the 9th annual Health IT
plus Digital Health plus RCM conference
taking place October 1st through 4th at the
luxurious Hyatt Regency Chicago.
Picture the excitement as you collect countless business
cards, forging invaluable connections with over 25 100
executive level attendees.
Feel the buzz of ideas flowing as you
engage in meaningful conversations about the future of
healthcare technology.
Envision yourself attending sessions led by over 415
elite speakers
gaining insights that could transform your organization.
From digital transformation and telehealth to clinician burnout
and cybersecurity,
each topic is designed to spark new ideas
and provide actionable takeaways, but it doesn't stop
there. Imagine sitting in a packed auditorium listening
to motivating keynotes from some of the biggest
names in sports.
Four time Super Bowl champion Rob Gronkowski,
WNBA champion and author Lisa Leslie, and NFL
legend and ESPN analyst
Eli Manning will be there sharing their stories
and inspiring you to reach new heights.
All around you, the future of Health IT
unfolds, and you're not just a spectator,
you're an active participant.
Don't wait. You can find the event website
and get registered by visiting beckershospitalreview.com
and clicking on the events page. That's the
beckershospitalreview.com
events page.
This is Laura Dierda with the Becker's Dental
Plus DSO podcast. I'm thrilled today to be
joined by Adam Rykicki,
chief executive officer of Archway Dental Partners. Adam,
it's a pleasure to have you on the
podcast today.
Well, thank you so much for having me.
Now I'm looking forward to our discussion and
really learning more about what you're doing at
Archway. But before we dive in, can you
tell me a little bit more about yourself
and your background?
Sure.
As you said, I'm the, the CEO of
Archway Dental Partners.
We are fast growing, doctor led, multispecialty
dental partnership organization here in New England. But
we were actually the largest provider of care
in the state of Connecticut, actually.
Built that legacy over 53 years.
Personally, I've been in dentistry for the last
23 years, leading multispecialty,
high quality organization. It's not too too dissimilar
from Archway Dental Partners that in which I
joined back in 2016.
And I and I live here in Connecticut
to help.
Well, fantastic. That sounds like you've had just
a really fascinating career, and, so I'm excited
to learn more about your experience and really
where you see things headed.
1st and foremost, what are some of the
biggest issues that you're following in dentistry right
now? I know there's so much happening. It
seems like an exciting and dynamic field, especially
over the last couple years. So, you know,
what is really top of mind for you
right now?
Sure. Yeah. Obviously,
you know, the the labor market and its
ebbs and flows have been both an opportunity
and concerns of organizations across the economy. I
do think that dentistry and health care as
a whole, but dentistry specifically, has maybe been
a little disproportionately affected by some of the
labor market ups and downs. So, obviously, we
we follow really closely,
the availability
and, of course, the cost of crucial team
members like hygienists and support team
all the way up to including,
our doctor professionals as well.
The wage inflation and availability of great people
is definitely something that, is not just unique
to dentistry, but, again, some place we've been
hit pretty hard.
We we just have to continue to be
in the place that team members and clinicians
actually wanna be a part of. And I
think as we keep doing that, we'll we'll
see that, those concerns,
improve over time.
The labor market is definitely a big piece
of it. I think the second part of
it is,
kind of looking at
what how technology
can
not be a hindrance to, but be a
supportive aspect of what we do in dentistry.
There's a lot of clinical and business technology
that exists in the space today, and I
think that our industry has gotten a little
bit,
a little bit confused and a little bit
of overzealous with the utilization of some technology,
and we wanna get that right and make
sure that we're deploying the best types of
technologies that are great for our doctors and
our clinicians. And that takes a really kinda
keen eye and and some strategic planning over
time.
That makes a lot of sense. And, you
know, it really just has been interesting to
see a lot of the technology that has
come out, and really dive into figuring out
what's makes the most difference, what's really worth
that investment. I know every health care dollar
is precious. So from your perspective, when you're
looking at, you know, some of the and
whether it's new technologies or, on the clinical
side or or even the administrative side on
automation and those kinds of things as well.
How do you evaluate
where to move forward, what to trial out,
and where it really makes the most sense
to invest some of your your, capital,
for for the year?
That's a good question. And I think that
the the reverse of that is is what
we may have been victim to in the
industry over the past few years, which is
buying the bright and shiny new toys.
When when reality when when you integrate a
new technology into a health care business, it
has to be providing value above and beyond
just its financial value, which is very important,
of course, that it be productive. But is
it adding to the satisfaction
of the clinicians in the space? Is it
actually improving
clinical outcomes? And if it checks the three
boxes of being productive,
clinical
improvements, what we can deliver as far as
care goes, and improve the
overall
happiness and wellness of our clinical community, then
it's something worthy of continuing that, kind of
exploration. And there are from digital technologies to
AI, a lot of these things that have
circled us that can check all of those
boxes,
but they should.
That makes a lot of sense, and, you
know, it's helpful thought process. Now
looking ahead, what are you most excited about
for the future, and what makes you nervous?
Sure. I I'm very excited by just
overall growth opportunities that lie ahead of us,
growth and other opportunities that lie ahead of
us. Obviously, solidifying our presence here in the
state of Connecticut is really exciting.
You know, being the largest provider of care
in the state is both
exciting and and and, sure, a little bit
of an ego trip. But we have a
we have we have a lot of people
to care for, and we have to make
sure we keep doing that really well. But
it's really exciting to conceive of
expanding beyond
our state and being in other nearby geographies
where we could do the type of high
quality care
and the type of career building for our
providers in other geographies that are similar to
Connecticut, such as Massachusetts, New York, and and
so on. So we're really excited about that.
And and back to what we do just
sky describing, I'm I'm excited to keep on
unlocking these opportunities that allow us to do
those other first for three things, which is
improving the quality of care we deliver to
patients and improving the type of a practice
we offer our dentist to to put their
career into.
And we gotta keep uncovering those kind of
opportunities, but it's a great focal point. And
I and I love seeing these,
growing new practices and new environments with happy
doctors who are actually doing better care for
patients. It's it's very exciting to see that.
Things that I think would be, you know,
continuing worries into the future, of course, you
know, the labor market and inflationary environment we're
in today is is something to keep a
close eye on.
The availability of great great people is never
more important than it is in a high
growth environment.
And, of course, you know, it's we're not
living in the most precedents of times, and
we have to always watch what's going on
in both in the macroeconomic
and political arenas and how that might affect
the, the scale of dentistry. So so definitely
something that the state ladies are focused on.
That's fascinating to hear. And, you know, especially
as you talk about the workforce
in trying to bring in talented
folks and retain them as well. I can
imagine a lot of our listeners are nodding
their head in agreement and really see a
lot of similar things that you are. So
are there any adjustments that you've made at
Archway,
in response to
the current job market, to really
give you a sense of what it will
take, to recruit and retain the best staff?
Absolutely. I'll I'll I'll maybe share some one
very important tidbit there.
And and for the nonclinicians,
not not the hygienists or the doctors.
It it it became apparent to us a
few years ago that the dental industry is
gonna need to produce
more of the candidates than it that it
needs than it did in the past, which
means that we may have to,
recruit and hire talent from different different areas
of expertise, like, say, customer service,
that have hard to learn traits so that
we can teach them the rest of it.
So which means you have to be able
to take someone who is a great deliverer
of customer service, but turn them into a
capable dental assistant, assistant, which means you have
to produce all the training programs, collateral material,
and support necessary to get that person from
a to b. And doing that at scale,
I think, is really important as the economy
isn't necessarily producing the types of candidates we
need on a regular basis and and and
to the tune that we need them. So
we have to be better at producing them.
That makes a lot of sense. And, you
know, I I think that's such a great
tip and helpful way to process how you
can meet some of the challenges and and
still bring in, folks, you know, who have
the right intangibles and then teach them the
things you can teach them in order to,
you know, fulfill the positions that you need.
So that's fascinating to hear. Before we wrap
up, I'm wondering what will be the most
effective things that health care leaders will need
in the next 2 to 3 years to
be successful?
Yeah. I think it's being being very thoughtful
and focusing on adding value.
It's kind of a topic we've been talking
about around here for the last couple of
years. When we are a high growth organization
and you're either hiring a lot, you're acquiring
a lot of practices,
you're putting forth a lot of strategic initiatives,
if you're not using the lens of, well,
it has to add value to all of
its participants,
you might find yourself on the losing side
of the coin versus the winning side. If
you can say to yourself, well, this new
practice, it's gonna add value to our patient
demographic. It's gonna unlock access. It's gonna make
my providers,
happier to have be in a market they
might wanna be in and the type of
facility they wanna be in.
If you and can we actually add value
to entire equation?
That's that's kind of the secret sauce, I
think, going forward further into dentistry here.
Every
new recruit, are you adding value to them?
Are they higher adding value to you? And
a real focus on our ability to add
value to all of those different circumstances
is
really the the the strategic focus that I
think is necessary.
That's amazing to hear. Thank you so much,
Adam, for joining us on the podcast today.
I really appreciate your time
perspective, and I look forward to connecting with
you again soon.
You got it. Thank you so much.