When it comes to scaling a podiatry business, most clinic owners focus on marketing, systems, or technology, but few pay enough attention to people. In this week’s episode of the Podiatry Legends Podcast, I sat down again with Dr Patrick McEneaney from Northern Illinois Foot & Ankle Specialists, who now oversees 16 clinics and 18 doctors.
Patrick’s story is a masterclass in what it really takes to grow, not just in size, but in strength.
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Growth Isn’t Just About Numbers
When Patrick bought his first clinic 11 years ago, he inherited a single location that had been stable for two decades. Within a few years, he’d multiplied that into a regional network of clinics. But what impressed me most wasn’t the number; it was his discipline in consolidating when necessary.
Patrick shared how he’s opened, merged, and even closed clinics based purely on data, not ego. He understands that growth for growth’s sake can sink a business just as fast as stagnation can. “You have to play the numbers game,” he said. “If the clinic isn’t performing or it’s draining resources, you make the tough call.”
That mindset, treating your practice as a business rather than just a medical service, is what separates the average clinic owner from the strategic entrepreneur.
Hiring for Fit, Not Just Skill
We also discussed the challenge of employing the right podiatrists. Many clinic owners rush to fill a position, but Patrick takes a slower, more deliberate approach.
He interviews multiple times, meets candidates outside the clinic setting, and always looks for two key qualities: social connection and cultural alignment. “If I didn’t want to have a beer with them, they probably won’t connect with patients,” he said.
He also runs what I’d call “the honesty test.” During interviews, he encourages candidates to abandon rehearsed answers and speak candidly about what they enjoy, what they avoid, and where they want to grow. “If they resist early on, that’s a red flag,” Patrick added. “The first few days on the job are the best they’ll ever be. If you’re getting friction, then it won’t get better.”
The Power of Tracking and Training
Patrick’s approach to leadership is deeply data-driven. He shared how one of his most valuable reports, the One-and-Done and Two-and-Done reports, revealed a significant gap in patient retention between doctors.
One practitioner had nearly 47% of new patients fail to return for a follow-up visit. Another was below 10%. Same region, same brand, same patient demographics, completely different outcomes.
Those numbers told a story about communication, care philosophy, and training. “It’s not a problem with the community,” Patrick said. “It’s usually a problem with how you’re treating patients.”
That level of attention to data helps him coach his team more effectively, ensuring that patient care standards and profitability stay high across all clinics.
Letting Go of the Ego
We both agreed that scaling a podiatry business isn’t about chasing the most significant footprint; it’s about building a sustainable model. Sometimes that means saying no to the next shiny opportunity. Sometimes it means merging two clinics and walking away from a lease.
Patrick summed it up perfectly: “When you look purely at the numbers, not your ego, the right decision becomes obvious.”
Final Thoughts
Whether you have one clinic or five, the real growth comes from clarity; clarity around your team, your metrics, and your purpose. Patrick’s story reminds every podiatrist that you can’t grow alone. You need the right people around you, aligned with your values, following the same playbook.
What Should You Do Next?
If you’re serious about growing your podiatry business, but you’re unsure how to hire the right people, manage multiple locations, or make data-driven decisions like Patrick, that’s exactly what I help clinic owners with.
I work directly with podiatrists who want to expand without chaos, create a high-performing team, and turn their practice into a thriving, sustainable business.
Visit www.tysonfranklin.com to learn more.
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PODCAST TRANSCRIPT (Unedited)
Tyson E Franklin: [00:00:00] Hi, I am Tyson Franklin and welcome back to this week’s episode of the podiatrist at Legends podcast. With me today is a return guest. He’s been on multiple times. It is Dr. Patrick McEneaney from Chicago, and he is the northern Illinois foot and ankle specialist that is the name of his business.
He’s been on here, but each time he’s come on, we keep talking about the progress of his clinic, which is why I keep getting Patrick back and he’s now up to 16 podiatrist clinics in the northern Illinois area. So Patrick, welcome back to the podcast.
Patrick McEneaney : Well, thanks for having me again. It’s always great to sit down and talk with you.
Tyson E Franklin: Every time you come on, I’m always inspired by what you’ve been doing and the feedback I get from other people that listen to your, listen to the episodes you, you’re on are always positive as well. So if you’re a dud, guess I wouldn’t get you back.
Patrick McEneaney : Well, podiatrist is a great profession and, it’s interesting because what you put into it is what you get back.
Tyson E Franklin: Oh, definitely. And
Patrick McEneaney : so, I’ve been, , working and [00:01:00] building and putting a lot into my practice and building up my team and, it may not show it every day.
, There’s some days you have rough days, rough weeks. Things seem, , bad, you get a bunch of denials and , next week you have a great week and you get those denials approved and you get your, you get paid by the insurance and , you see more patients in the last week.
So, , it’s the law of averages with this. You have to look at everything that’s happening and, sometimes with patients when they have surgery, you’re like. The other patients are like, , I’m not doing better than yesterday. Or like, Hey, you know, two days ago I was doing better.
And I tell ’em like, you gotta work week to week or month to month. And it’s like that , with your practice. You have to not always dwell what’s going on day to day, when you look at the end of the month, , are we having a better month than last time? Do, are we having a better month than last year?
Are we seeing good trends going forward?
Tyson E Franklin: So when you look at your 16 clinics and , what’s the distance between them all?
Patrick McEneaney : So the, if you look at , our farthest north to south, it’s about two and a half hours. Oh wow. Okay. And east to west , is two and a half to three hours. [00:02:00]
Tyson E Franklin: But, and when you are talk and when we’re talking population, what population would that be covering?
Patrick McEneaney : Oh, geez.
Tyson E Franklin: Um, this is just to give people overseas perspective of. America’s a big place.
Patrick McEneaney : It really is. It’s gotta be, probably a million people at least. Okay, okay. So it’s a,
Tyson E Franklin: it’s a decent area.
Patrick McEneaney : Yeah.
Tyson E Franklin: So when you are looking at your 16 clinics, do you ever, some days sit back and the reason I’m asking this is because I know you’ve got successful clinics.
, You’re a very positive person, but I know there’d be podiatrist listening to this who have got multiple clinics or are thinking about having multiple clinics. Do you ever sit back some days and wish you just had one again, or do you go No, I would never get back to one. I’d be bored.
Patrick McEneaney : Well, it’s an interesting story.
So the, I bought, , I bought the clinic. I’m at, the original clinic 11 years ago, and that was in July. And the doctor who was there only had one clinic and, he was there 20 years , and only had one clinic. [00:03:00] And I’m like, why do you not have another one? And when he had one clinic, it was, everything’s easy to control.
The, you don’t have to worry about everything. You can keep an eye on everything. And, , moving from one clinic to two clinics is a huge jump. Hmm. It’s an absolute huge jump because you’re not there to keep an eye on everything. You don’t see what happens. You have to trust other people that are gonna watch things.
Whereas when I had one clinic, , I could always see an eye. I have an eye on what was going on. And you take that from two to three to four. , There’s clinics that I, I don’t see, , for six months. Okay. And I gotta trust that my doctors are watching the clinic. I gotta trust that, , my other team is watching the clinics , and it’s a collective.
Um, group of people that are reporting back and , there’s times you go into a clinic and you’re like, wow, the walls are really dinged up. Why has anybody reached out? And we touched a paint, and it’s , everyone’s like, oh yeah, we probably need that. And I’m like, well, why didn’t you tell me? Yeah.
So part of it is like training your team to say Hey, if this was your house, what would you do? [00:04:00] And , if you notice , the sink’s leaking, then you give us a call and we get , the sink fixed, in your house. You wouldn’t just let that leak forever and waste all that water.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah. But I suppose it’s one of those things too, when you are in a place and you are there every single day, seeing it all the time, you don’t notice certain things. But when somebody else comes along, give you an example. My old Lexus that I had, little 200 H loved driving. It was fantastic. Anyway, when my daughter turned 18, got a license, I gave her that car.
So at the time I gave it to her, it was probably nine or 10 years old, but at the time, I gave it to her saying, this car still goes , really well. I then went and bought a new one, driving that car around for nine months. All of a sudden, my daughter was at our place. She had parked in, so I jumped in , her car now to just go down the shop.
Now, only nine months ago I was driving that car thinking this is still a really nice car to drive. I hopped in the car and I drove it. I went, my God, this thing [00:05:00] rattles. It makes noises. The steering isn’t as good, the suspension isn’t as good. And I went, you can really tell if this is an old car compared to the brand new one.
I think that’s what happens when you are in your own clinic, day in, day out. That you don’t see things sometimes you need those fresh eyes to come in.
Patrick McEneaney : I think that’s the case and, , nobody keeps an eye on things like the owner does. Oh, no. And, I’ll walk down the hall and I’ll see that there’s, something on the floor and I’ll pick it up and throw it in the garbage, , whereas, seven other people have walked by it because, , again, there’s some ownership with good employees where they’re worrying about things, but.
They don’t, still don’t worry about it the same way I do. Every like week or so, I’ll go into a couple treatment rooms and I’ll just sit in the chair. Yeah. And I look around and I’ll look at the ceiling, I’ll look at the walls and I’ll look at what the patient see.
And I’ll be like, oh, , we probably need to, , touch up the paint right there. Or, what , the picture frame, it looks a little dirty, but it needs to be cleaned or, , [00:06:00] this needs to be, , this needs to be updated. And so I think that’s a good thing to do , to help develop what your patients are seeing.
Because if you’re not sitting in their perspective, you only see what you see from your perspective.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah, I used to get the receptionist to do that. I’d have them sit out in the reception area. They’d go sit in every single seat, sit there for a couple of minutes and just look around. What can the patient see that you can’t see the paper that’s under the desk?
The cobwebs in a certain area are things untidy, and I have the podiatrist do the same thing. It’s go and sit in the patient’s chair and just look at it from their perspective, because you are always looking at the patient, what’s in front of you, but when the patient’s looking behind you, what’s your shelf look like?
I always to say the patient at 5:30 deserves that room to look as good as what it did at 8:30. Uh, when the first patient came in, they don’t deserve anything less.
Patrick McEneaney : Absolutely.
Tyson E Franklin: So when you had multiple clinics and you said some, you hadn’t been there for six months, you were relying on feedback, were you also using certain [00:07:00] particular numbers of the business that you would look at?
Like numbers, orthotic, turnover for you might be, , surgical appointments where you’re looking at those sort of figures.
Patrick McEneaney : Oh, , I was talking about the physical clinic, but like no, we’re monitoring numbers all the time. Yeah. And it’s amazing what numbers will teach you. So , we were sitting there and we were having , a lot of new patients and, um, but I wasn’t seeing like our, in, in certain clinics.
I wasn’t seeing like our numbers increase of our overall visits. If you have more new patients coming in, you should have more follow-up visits, right? Mm. And so we ran a number, we ran a report, and I did like a, a one and done report, and these were patients who came in and didn’t come in for a second visit.
So, , we could assume that we’re such good doctors that we solved everything in one visit. Yeah. But, , that’s not always the case. I used to, that was
Tyson E Franklin: my favorite report. I used to like looking at from new patient to what happened next.
Patrick McEneaney : And so we would run a one and done report and I got some information that, but I’m [00:08:00] like, you know what, let’s run a two and a one and done or two and done report.
And so what I did is I filed this down to people who, , didn’t come back for a third visit. Yeah. And these were these people who were reappointed for a third visit. I did a separate report on the ones that were made as needed after their first or second visit. And I found out that some docs were, there was one doc who was shuffling through patients, and if they weren’t surgical, kicking ’em out.
You have a bunion, okay? You don’t want surgery. Come back when you do, , not treat them with ortho, not giving shots, not doing anything else because you just wanted to operate. And when I did this one and done two and done report, I found that um, there were some docs as low as 10% and there was one doc as high as 47%.
Tyson E Franklin: Okay.
Patrick McEneaney : And so when you start looking at 47% of your patients when they’re reappointed after their first or second visit aren’t coming back,
Tyson E Franklin: that’s a lot
Patrick McEneaney : then. That’s not necessarily a problem with the community. That’s usually a problem with how you’re treating patients.
Tyson E Franklin: [00:09:00] Yeah.
Patrick McEneaney : Again, there’s some patients that come in just find fact finding and they wanna know they have plantar fasciitis and they’re gonna go online and Google the rest of it, or go to chat GPT and get all that information , and self-treat that stuff. Kind of stuff’s gonna happen. There’s gonna be people who, for financial reasons, don’t come in for a second visit, but you shouldn’t see like a 10% to a gap in the high forties.
Within the same practice in the same region.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah. We used to have what I call a A soft conversion and a hard conversion. So a soft conversion was person comes in for their initial consultation and from that initial consultation, what happened next, and in my opinion, it should have been 90, 95% of people should be having a second visit.
Depending on what they came in for. So say for example, we’re looking at MSK, biomechanical type patients, 95% of them, if they’ve come in with symptom, something should be happening next. The hard conversion rate was then [00:10:00] from that group who ended up having other treatment, whether it was orthotics, shockwave therapy, exercise, they had multiple visits afterwards and if their soft conversion rate’s really bad, then you knew the hard conversion rate was gonna be really bad.
Yeah.
And usually there’s no excuse, just lazy.
There’s always
Patrick McEneaney : an excuse, but they’re not good ones.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah. Okay. Yeah, it’s like I tell, like I used to say to people. If your conversion rate, that soft conversion rate is a hundred percent, I go, I’d be surprised it should never probably be a hundred percent because people will come in just for an opinion or just for a second opinion.
Or as soon as they come in they tell you, look, I’m strapped for cash. I just need, what’s the quickest, fastest thing just to reduce my pain? ’cause I’m about to go on a two week holiday and I’ll get back in touch with you then. So I never expect to be a hundred percent. But I do recall having someone with me and their conversion rate, even their soft conversion rate was like under [00:11:00] 50% and I’m going, that is so bad.
Patrick McEneaney : And, part of it is, , it depends on how the doctor practices and how they think about things. So I’ll tell you a story. So I had a patient come in and, uh, I had one of my, uh, doctors had just started with us. And so when our new doctors start up out of residency, they spent some time shadowing and learn, how we work things.
And so she went into a patient’s room, comes back out, she’s , the guy’s got fungal toenails. And I’m like, what are we doing for him? She’s like, well, he wants to use a, a topical medication. And I’m like, did you talk to him about oral medication? She goes, yeah, , he likes to drink his beer. He’s not interested in doing that.
He’s a farmer. And, and so I’m like, did you talk to him about laser? And she goes, go in and look at the guy. She’s , he’s like six five. He’s like over 300 pounds. He’s in overalls, dirty calloused fingers. And she’s , he’s a farmer. She’s , he’s not gonna be able to afford that.
And I walk right in and I talk to him and say, Hey, , how are you gonna, are you gonna be able to reach your toes? Easy? He goes, well, not easy. I can probably get it done [00:12:00] though, where my wife can help me. And I’m like, okay. I’m like, I, I heard we don’t wanna do the oral medication. He goes, no. I said, what about laser therapy?
He said, tell me about that. And so I, I spent some time explaining laser therapy for nails. Before I could finish talking about it, he reaches into his pocket, pulls out a wad of hundreds Like this fifth. Yeah. And says, how many is it? And just Zer County. , And , I told him how much it costs.
He pulled that money outta his pocket and handed it right to me. And he is like, and I’m like, well, I’ll bring it to the front desk for you. Yeah. And , it’s interesting because, I think there’s an inherent nature for us , to profile PE people based on what we think they can afford.
Tyson E Franklin: It’s true,
Patrick McEneaney : and it, it’s the same thing that, it’s like we wouldn’t profile people based on their race, ethnicity, gender, anything like that. So, so why are we gonna profile people on what we think they can afford? , , there’s this thing where some doctors are afraid to, Medicare doesn’t cover orthotics in America.
And , unless they’re attached to a brace. And so, I have doctors who like will just get the [00:13:00] patients, , the off the shelf medical grade inserts ’cause they’re cheaper and they don’t even ask the people if they want an orthotic.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah.
Patrick McEneaney : And the orthotics gonna do a better job. We know it’s gonna provide more relief.
And , I had a lady the other day, I said, Hey, uh, I said, our options here are these medical grade inserts. , Where I can get you in a custom molded orthotic. And she turns to me and she goes, you know what? She’s like, my grandkids. I’ve got seven of ’em.
They haven’t seen me in six months. And and my son, I haven’t talked to him in forever. I’ll take three pairs of ortho outs.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah, and
Patrick McEneaney : It’s interesting because, , I do think we should be providing the same opportunities and same care to everybody. And the patients that can’t afford the care, they’ll tell me like, I can’t afford that.
Gimme a cheaper option.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah. I had a podiatrist work for me certain period of time and he went away on holidays for two weeks while he was away. He had 15 patients booked in to pick up their pre-made orthotics. Expect. Then we didn’t keep him on stock, we just ordered ’em as we need them. I’m going, geez, [00:14:00] that’s a lot. 15 pairs in the two weeks while he is away.
‘Cause I would hardly do any pre mates as the patients came in, I thought I said to ’em outta curiosity. Why did you choose to get a pre-made orthotic over a custom made orthotic? And they went, oh, what’s a custom made orthotic? Oh geez. I went, shit, me. Okay. So 14 out of the 15, decided to get custom made orthotics when I explained it to him.
And when he came back from holidays, I pulled him aside and said, Hey, I saw 15 of your patients you had booked him for these primates. 14 or 15, got custom made orthotics. Why did you not explain custom made orthotics? Anybody said to me, I don’t believe in orthotics. And I went Anyway. So when he finished up with me that day, it was, uh, it was, it was very,
Patrick McEneaney : very nice to meet you.
There’s the door.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah. And this was really early on when I probably only had my own practice for a couple of years up [00:15:00] here in Cairns, maybe the. The first or second person I ever employed, it made me realize that we are not all equal. We don’t have the same beliefs, we don’t have the same thinking.
We treat things differently, which is why you need to keep track of your numbers and your stats. So when you employ somebody, it really quickly gives you an idea how they think, and if it doesn’t fit your business, you need to remove them as fast as possible.
Patrick McEneaney : Yeah. , And I think the hiring process is really important.
Yeah. , Like I’ve known people, they do a quick, , interview over, a webcam interview. They’ll talk to someone for 10 minutes and hire ’em. And like to me, I talk to people multiple times I’ve got to the position where like sometimes I’ll take people out to dinner because I need to see them out of the, out of this type of setting where they’re being all professional and trying the hardest, for 20 minutes to impress you.
Mm. And you need to sit with people and relax with them and talk to ’em and see more about how they do things. And , I [00:16:00] think anybody who’s had, , hired enough employees, have hired people and been like, Ooh, I made a mistake. And if they don’t fit you, they don’t fit your culture. , You need to get, you need to, , terminate them.
, Not only for your wellbeing and your practice, but also for them. ’cause if they don’t fit with your culture, they’re not gonna do well with us. Oh, definitely. And, , I had an interview with one gentleman and, . We were talking and he’s , I’m like, what would a good day look like with a good week look like?
He’s , I’d like to have a full day on Monday and full day on Tuesday. I’m like, okay. He’s Wednesday would like to be my surgery day. Maybe like a half day on Thursday. And then I need Fridays for an admin day to do all my charts. And I’m like, so where’s the lake house?
, Where’s your lake house at that you wanna leave? , You wanna leave, , halfway through the week and , come back on Monday. And he is oh, well it’s in Michigan. And I’m like, , that’s not the kind of practice this is. You’d be on call. Yeah, you’d be doing this. He’s , I can work on that.
And I go, no, you need to go to a hospital or somewhere that has that [00:17:00] schedule if that’s what you want. I said, , but you don’t wanna cram that into here ’cause you’re never gonna be happy being here. That
Tyson E Franklin: is a good point. That is a really good point. And,
Patrick McEneaney : and so you have to read between the lines. , I had another time I interviewed somebody and, .
, We were talking , and halfway through the interview I’m like, alright, can we stop for a second? I said, I feel I’m getting all the answers that you think I want and not your real answers. Mm. I said, so, I’m gonna give you a chance to start over here and let’s just start, ask, let me ask you these questions again, and I want your real answers.
And I found out that the real answers were completely different than when what the person first said. And it is interesting. , You gotta keep interviews real, you gotta keep them. I try to keep them somewhat laid back and, , I try to like really figure out who this person is and how they wanna practice.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah. I, I think what I definitely agree that when you’re employing someone, usually most of the red flags are given to you during that interview. Yeah. And when the guy said, I’ll try, [00:18:00] I’ll see if I can make that work. It’s isn’t that. You’re not bloody making it work. It works.
This is how we do it. If it, if you don’t think you can do this, and to me, as soon as somebody puts up any sort of barrier, if I was saying, this is how we do things, and they go, oh well I like to do it this way. To me that was always the wrong answer. ’cause they would say, this is how we do it. This is how we all do it.
This is how you’ll be doing it. Oh, but I’d like to do it this way. Wrong answer again.
Yeah.
, I reckon if you employ that person and they’ve already told you that they’d like to do something different, you can’t complain when they do something different.
Patrick McEneaney : No, you can’t. And, , the initial interviews, the first few days of work, those are usually , the best people are gonna act.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah.
Patrick McEneaney : And so, and then they’re gonna fall into habits and fall into what their preferences are. And so if you’re getting resistance in an interview, in a few first few days, you know it’s not a good sign. Mm,
Tyson E Franklin: I’ve had a lot of coaching clients and a lot of, they’ve employed, a lot of people have had some that have, we’ve [00:19:00] gone through the process on who they’re gonna employ and what we’ve been looking at.
And there’s a few tricks that you can do. And it’s worked out really well. And who, other ones who have gone, oh, they’ve gone opposite of what I told ’em to do. I just needed someone to put a hat on the head, podiatrist on the front of it and I went, you know what? You’d be better to just be working by yourself or, yeah, just you and the other.
You don’t need that podiatrist ’cause it’s going to cause problems. And it always did. The amount of
Patrick McEneaney : time, the amount of time you have to spend fixing all those problems. Mm. You’d be better off working more hours during the week and you’d, it’d be more profitable for it and have less headaches.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah. Yeah. And it’s your reputation that gets affected as well.
Absolutely.
What do you get people when they go to employ somebody? I give ’em a, I cut up all these pieces of paper and write all these different types of podiatry problems on there.
It could be heel pain, might be treating a neuroma, callous on the heels. , Debriding a corn, just fungal nails. All this stuff all written down. I say write down 20 pieces of paper. Give it to ’em and tell ’em to put it in [00:20:00] order of the type of patients that they really enjoy treating.
Yeah.
I said when they put that all in order, ’cause you might have as one on the, one of the pieces of paper, general treatment, but then you might have, debriding a corn and some people go, well, isn’t that the same thing?
Well, not really. If I had to write, I didn’t mind really getting in and digging outta corners, find a bit of fun, actually. Mm-hmm. But to just be doing general routine foot care all, they would drive me nuts. So I might put debriding a corn higher towards the top. ’cause a lot of times if you had a biomechanical patient come in, sometimes they had a corn that needed treating.
So it didn’t bother me to treat it. Heel fishes, hated wounds, hate it ulcers. Hated that would be right down the bottom. So when you get them to rate. What they like and don’t like in order, and they have to put it in order. Can’t put anything the same if it doesn’t match with your clinic. If I was employing someone and they said, I really love high risk diabetic feet ulcers, and I’m going [00:21:00] that it’s not my clinic.
We’re MSK biomechanics, orthotic sports. That’s predominantly what we do.
Patrick McEneaney : Yeah. No, again, it’s, it is finding the right doctor, the right culture. , I like to find, people who are social. Yeah. I think, , I always think if I was sitting at an airport bar having a beer, , would I want to talk to.
And, , would everybody else at the bar want to talk to you? , And would somebody buying you a drink saying very nice to meet you? If you have those people who are social and can, , really communicate well, , they do very well with patients and they become very believable.
I’ve seen doctors who are , very smart and are, are that social and they don’t tend to do as well.
Tyson E Franklin: I agree. Um,
Patrick McEneaney : I think that’s one of the most important things to find. And then finding people who are malleable. You have people who, they come in and I say, Hey, we’ve got certain protocols we like to run by these protocols.
, They’re not set in stone, but, you have people like, no, no, no. I do things my way. Talk about red flags, that’s a huge red flag. And so [00:22:00] finding people who are willing to follow the lead of, this is how our clinic runs, this is the culture, this is how we do things.
Um, I think that’s really important when you’re hiring people.
Tyson E Franklin: I definitely think the social side of things is really important. , I think back to some of the people that I had employed over the years and some of ’em that didn’t last very long, didn’t really have much to do with them socially.
Some that were with me for many years. We had a lot of laughs and a lot of good times together. And whenever you were doing something as a group, they were always involved. They were usually the instigator of fun. Right. And, and they were just a joy to be around. But there were other people who worked with us, not just podiatrist, but even your support staff who, they’d walk into work and you’d wanna do anything with them outside of work and they would pretty much just go, no, sorry, I don’t socialize with the people I work with.
They were very short-lived and they weren’t the best communicators with patients either.
Patrick McEneaney : Employees wanna go home and have their own life, that’s [00:23:00] fine. But , you wanna get the people who aren’t just punching in. Like, I have fun at work.
I have fun talking to patients. I have fun treating them. I have fun getting them better. , Our staff and I laugh, the patients laugh. , We try to, , people come in having pain and, , being frustrated. And if they can leave with a laugh or a chuckle or a smile. , That’s part of the reason they’re there, , on top of getting their condition treated.
Tyson E Franklin: So is there anything else you do when you are doing the interview process that you run through?
Patrick McEneaney : I try to see what people’s long-term goals are.
Tyson E Franklin: Oh, it’s a good one. Yeah.
Patrick McEneaney : And , I’ve had people say, , I wanna be the best surgeon in Chicago. I wanna do all this surgery. I wanna be, , the busiest person I wanna be speaking academically.
And I have other people that like, I just want a good work life balance. , I have people be like, I wanna make as much money as possible and , you can look at what their goals are,, but I’ve had people be like, yeah, , I got this whole degree. I’d just like to pay off my loans and,
I like treating people and, , whatever happens, happens. And it’s like, is that person someone that seems [00:24:00] motivated and someone that , is going to be productive in a practice?
Tyson E Franklin: Mm.
Patrick McEneaney : And so I, I really think it’s important to see long-term goals with, with ’em and, where they want to be in their future.
, It’s, I, I tell ’em it’s okay to have a family. It’s okay to, to do all this other stuff. Well, you said the, you
Tyson E Franklin: said the work life balance. I actually think. I used to find the podiatrist that I worked with who really wanted that work-life balance, actually worked harder than the person that says, I just want to be the legend in a particular area.
I want to do something else because they wanted to work hard so they could enjoy their life.
Patrick McEneaney : Right. And it is funny ’cause there’s a work-life balance, people that are like that. Yeah. And then there’s work life balance, which means I wanna work as little as possible and make as much money as I can, but I don’t wanna work hard.
And, , we’ve seen a whole new generation , of people that Yeah. Someone comes in and they’re like, oh, I don’t do wounds. And it’s like, well, you started yesterday, you have six patients on your schedule. Yes. You do wounds today. Yeah. See, that’s the thing. If you,
Tyson E Franklin: if you’re employing me, I [00:25:00] would’ve, and that’s what I said to somebody, if there’s something you don’t like in podiatrist, be upfront with it at the interview.
Because if they, if I said to you, oh, sorry, Patrick, but I can’t do wounds. I just, I dry reach. It’s just not a good look. When in front of the patient, if you went, oh, unfortunately, you’re probably gonna see, , half a dozen a week. Then I have to make a decision. If I say yes, then I must see wounds.
But if I say, oh, I, I can’t, and you still employ me, then I don’t see wounds.
Patrick McEneaney : And, and I think it’s important for anybody to realize that they need to be honest ’cause like for me, , I had one doc say , listen, I don’t do surgery.
I just, I only do, palliative care. And in some of clinics I have people that all they wanna do is surgery. And so putting a palliative person in their care, in their clinic is great. They can see all that. They can send me all the surgeries, and both are really happy,
Tyson E Franklin: very much,
Patrick McEneaney : but, but there’s situations where like I’ve hired docs and they’re like, I [00:26:00] can do everything surgically.
Don’t worry about it. And then all of a sudden they get a calcan fracture and they’re sending it to ortho because they’re like, oh, I don’t know how to do that. And I’m like, well, in the interview you said you did. Oh, , I just didn’t think I’d be getting those.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah,
Patrick McEneaney : and, so, nothing gets more frustrating for an owner than when you lie about what your capabilities are.
And again, there’s practices that you need to be able to do everything. There’s other practices where, again, in my practice if you don’t do something, if you don’t do ankle scopes, you send it to the guys who do.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah. I think being honest at the interview, especially if you have an interest in a certain area, might be treating children, then tell ’em I have a really strong interest in that area, but I’m prepared to do everything , and if you say you’re prepared to do everything, it means you are prepared to do everything.
Right.
Patrick McEneaney : And I tell my docs, I say, you know what? Get busy.
Tyson E Franklin: Mm.
Patrick McEneaney : Get, get your clinic full. Be booked out a few weeks. And when you hit that point, then you can start saying, , I don’t wanna see this anymore. I don’t wanna see wounds anymore. I don’t want to [00:27:00] see this anymore. , And then you can start siphoning in your practice into more of , what you want your waiting room to be like.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah. But
Patrick McEneaney : when you first start, , you can’t say I’m only doing surgical patients, and then sit with an empty waiting room and wondering why. Your production numbers are bad.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah. , I know when I graduated, I applied, I actually applied for one podiatrist job when I graduated, and I got it.
But I said to her at the beginning, before she said I had the job. I said, oh, I just gonna be really honest. I said, I, I don’t do wounds. And she goes, what do you mean you don’t do winds? I said, oh, if someone comes to an ulcer, I said, just the smell, it kills me. I said, , I get sick.
I really get sick. Even just looking at it, I said, it’s not good. I said, is, is that gonna be a problem? She went, oh, she went, I need somebody. She said, okay, you will not have to treat wounds. So I told her upfront that I wasn’t gonna do it, and she agreed I didn’t have to do it. And then we, uh, then we disagreed on pay.
So I didn’t end up taking the job, but that’s a whole different story. I was just greedy little bugger when I graduated [00:28:00] as some new graduates can be. Yeah. And, and I tell all new graduates now, don’t chase the money chase experience. Correct. I ended up setting up my own clinic. When I set up my own clinic.
I did see wounds initially because I need the money I’d rent to pay bills . So I said I’ll do wounds. So I did the wounds initially and I did, that’s how I figured out. I, yep. No matter how many I saw, I still dry reached, I still got sick, and I tell the patients I go, that might make just.
I am not good. And they, patients would just laugh. They accepted it once I got my clinic at a certain point that I didn’t need to do it anymore, I didn’t do it. Or when I had another clinic, when I had somebody else employed who didn’t mind doing it, I sent all my wounds over to them.
Yeah. I still
got, I couldn’t go in the room though for about 15 minutes after they treated wound.
’cause I could still smell it.
Patrick McEneaney : Well, I got a little secret for that.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah.
Patrick McEneaney : So when, uh, when I build new clinics or renovate clinics. I [00:29:00] put bathroom fans in the room.
Tyson E Franklin: Oh. So it sucks it out.
Patrick McEneaney : So there’s two light switches. One’s for the light and the other’s for the fan. And I get the quiet ones.
And, and you can flip ’em on while the patients are in the room and , it keeps the smell venting outside.
Tyson E Franklin: Oh, okay. So, yeah, like when you walk past a pastry shop and it smells really good.
Yeah, you walk
past a wound clinic and you go, oh my God. At least some patients, they know they’re in the right place.
Patrick McEneaney : Right? Right.
Tyson E Franklin: Uh, that’s terrible. So, but anyway, where to from here? What are you, what are your plans? Like I said, each time I have be on here, I normally wanna know what has Patrick got planned in the future?
Patrick McEneaney : You know, right now my biggest goal is to continue to market , and grow our practice.
We’ve got, 18 doctors now, and, the goal is to get all of them busy, , to the fullest extent that they can, that they want to handle. And our last clinic we picked up was [00:30:00] in, December of last year. And , from here. I’ve looked at other clinics.
I just haven’t seen anything that, , really, , fits in with what we’re looking for. And so, you just gotta continue to pound the pavement and market, , the marketing’s so important. Mm. Um, building relationships with doctors, with communities, with patients, , and, it’s real easy to throw money at Google AdWords , and to spend a lot of money digitally, but that’ll only get you so far at a certain point.
You put money out to Google and if people aren’t clicking, you’re not even spending all the money you put out.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah, it’s true.
Patrick McEneaney : But, but, but nothing beats a relationship.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah, I love marketing. That’s why I do my marketing master classes. I just, to me, it’s, it’s one of those things where you can be the best podiatrist in the world.
You can be the most social, where patients are going to absolutely love you, but they don’t know you exist. Then it’s gonna be a long, hard road to actually build your clinic up. Doesn’t mean you can’t, but it is a long, hard road when you know how to market [00:31:00] your business. Life is so much easier.
Patrick McEneaney : I think one of the hard things for a lot of doctors is, is you know, we’re always taught to be humble.
Mm. And we’re always taught to , just be introspective with everything we do. And I think to some degree we have to promote ourselves to patients. Without seeming cocky.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah. And,
Patrick McEneaney : and , I’ll have patients and they’ll get done with surgery and they’ll say, doc, thank you so much for fixing my bunion.
This is so great. I never thought it would be as good as it is. And they said thank you. And I’ll say, you know what? The best way to say thank you is to go on Google and leave a review for me. Yeah. I said, tell everybody else so that they can come find me and I can fix them too.
Tyson E Franklin: You know what?
I used to say, patients, you’ll like this. I’d say I am the second best podiatrist in Australia. And they go, and patients look at me and they go, you’re the second best. I go, yeah. They go, who’s the best? I go, I dunno, there must be someone better. I just haven’t met ’em yet. And the [00:32:00] patients would just.
And Yeah. You couldn’t say that with every patient. Yeah. I mean, you just, you got the patient where, you know you’re getting on with them.
Yeah.
And you can just drop a line that, , you just need to, uh, introduce a little bit of humor works every time, though. And so in my podiatrist, my podiatrist book, I used to say, yeah, this is the second best business book ever written.
And somebody go, what? What’s the best? And I said, oh, no, has to be one better. But I’ve never been able to find it. And it’s just, yeah, you can use it in so many aspects. I think.
Patrick McEneaney : But the other thing is when you’re out in the community, I’ll be at a, a Chamber of Commerce event and, we’ll be talking to people and,, they’re like, what do you do?
And instead of saying, oh, I’m a podiatrist, you know, I’ll be like, oh, you know, podiatrist, I fix bunions, I take care of, , foot pain. I deal with elderly people, who have chronic pain in their feet and giving people a little bit of information. They don’t always understand what you do.
And you have to not brag about what you do, but you have to inform people of, these are [00:33:00] the types of things that I do. ’cause people are like, oh, I didn’t know you did that. And then next thing you know, they’re in seeing you.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah. It’s we say the same thing when someone would come up to us and they say, oh, Tyson, what are you doing?
So I own Proarch Podiatry and basically we work with people that wanna stay active and pain free. If you just have a line worked out and we modify and change it at different times, but instead of saying, even just saying, oh, I treat this sort of problem. If they dunno what that problem is, then it doesn’t mean anything to them.
But everyone knows that everyone wants to stay active, everyone wants to stay healthy, they want to stay pain free. And that’s what we basically do at Proarch Podiatry. And, you knew if you answer it the right way. ’cause they would, you could see ’em go, oh, that’s interesting.
Tell me more. Right? If people are going, ah, right, and then they’re turning away and go, oh, hang on, this is my friend over there. I’m gonna walk off. Then you, you didn’t sell yourself.
Patrick McEneaney : Yeah. Yeah. You have to use open-ended questions, you have to use leading questions and you have to [00:34:00] draw people in that are interested.
Tyson E Franklin: So one thing I’m going to just point out to everyone too, which this is what we’ll finish up on, and I think this is important when you’re on here. Last time, December last year, you had 16 clinics. When I first met, you had two, and then over the six episodes you went to 16 and you were soon to buy your 17th one, which you did buy.
When you came on here today, the first thing I said to you before I pressed record was, Hey, how many clinics are you up to? Expecting you to say, I know 57 , and you said, oh, we’re back down to 16, and I thought that was really important that you’ve got to a certain point, but then you knew where you had two clinics.
Sometimes is better just to consolidate than having the two clinics.
Patrick McEneaney : And I, I’ve done that a few different times. , One time I literally bought two clinics that were across the street from each other. Yeah. It was , like a minute and a half walk between the two clinics.
That’s how close they were. I bought one, I bought the other. And , we merged ’em together. And I’ve done that a few different times [00:35:00] where we’ve bought clinics in the same neighborhood and consolidate ’em. This was one where I bought a clinic that was struggling. We built it up to a certain point, but the landlords were bad.
The, clinic was , the building itself was becoming more and more vacant from our referral sources. , The people who were there were just getting older. Yeah. And like didn’t really wanna play the referral game. And so the, there’s a certain benefit to being in a medical building.
You build referrals and build within what’s going on there. And otherwise you’d just be in a storefront and everybody driving by would see you. And so what happened with that clinic , is we were growing, but just not at the pace we needed to. And the fact that we had a bad landlord that, that, was looking to raise rent, who wasn’t changing light bulbs and doing other stuff that they should be, that, , we looked at it and we said, , we have another clinic like three miles away.
Why are we gonna keep this clinic here? Why don’t we just move it down the street and put it in a place where we’re already paying rent a place that’s already busy. Now it’ll look more busy, and now that doctor can pick up more [00:36:00] patients over in that area. And, we moved it and, over 90% of the patients followed us.
Tyson E Franklin: Hmm. And so for us
Patrick McEneaney : it was a huge win. It seems like when you’re looking at all of this, , oh no, I, I’m closing a clinic, like this is a big loss. And, with your ego a little bit, it’s like, well now I have one less clinic. I used to have one. I think it’s an
Tyson E Franklin: ego thing. Yeah.
Patrick McEneaney : But, but when you get past it and you look at the numbers, all of all of it, it, we took off a whole bunch of overhead.
, We didn’t have to pay, we didn’t have to have as much staff ’cause we already had staff at that other clinic. And on top of that, we were able to, , grow the business at another clinic and make that one even more profitable. And so I think , you have to play the numbers game and say, what is this clinic doing for me?
, Is it profitable? How profitable is it? , And we took a risk that maybe these patients won’t follow us, but they liked the doctor , and a lot of ’em were able to follow us to where we went. So overall it was a win. There’s other times that you, people may do that and it may not turn out well because you have to know what the neighborhoods are like.
You have to know where the patients are. I, I had patients in this neighborhood here who will [00:37:00] go here, but they won’t go to the neighborhood next door. Yeah. , And there’s socioeconomic issues. There’s, just other types of, , just issues with towns and rivalries , and distances and so you have to know your neighborhoods really well when you’re gonna shift from one clinic to the other.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah. We did a similar thing where I had Cairns and we had another clinic, Smithfield, which was 30 minute drive away. And I originally had set that clinic up ’cause it did cater to a different area to like Northern Beaches and an area called the tablelands. From opening up, it took off really fast, went really great, and I went, oh geez.
I’m a genius Knew. I knew I was just doing the right thing here, after I had it there five years yeah. Um, I just made the same call. I looked at it and just went, ’cause it was in a shopping center, so the rents were really high and then no, we just made the decision if we close that, we made money from it.
We’ve done pretty well. If we close it, even if 25% of the patients come over. Then that’s a good thing. And I think it ended up about [00:38:00] 45% of the patients came over ’cause there were other podiatrists in between where that clinic was and us. So we knew you weren’t gonna get everybody. But by able, by consolidating to our main clinic in Cairns, our main clinic in Cairns grew 30 or 40% within about 12 or 18 months.
By focusing, not splitting staff, not sharing staff between clinics, when there were holidays, it, it did make life a little bit easier.
Patrick McEneaney : Yeah, you have to treat it like a business, not a medical practice at times. Yeah. And you have to look at those things and say, , if I was looking just solely based on the numbers, not on my ego, not on staffing, not on, everything else, would I, is this something that’s profitable enough that I should be keeping and putting?
And there’s times I’ve looked at offices and I’m like, this is a great office. It’s got a good base. I know I could build this up, but I’m looking at it and I’m like. The amount of time I have to spend, if I spent that where I’m at right now, I’ll be more profitable building this clinic up, spending all those hours here, and I don’t have to spend the extra money of buying that [00:39:00] clinic and the extra headaches.
Yeah.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah. It’d be great though if you had one clinic, as soon as you have up a second, yeah. Income doubled. Wouldn’t that be awesome? And then when you open up the third clinic, you’re making three times as much. And when you have 10 clinics, you’re making 10 times as much as what you did.
You just have the one clinic, but it doesn’t work that way.
Patrick McEneaney : But, there’s a lot of stories about this. So there was a guy out by us who had a successful pizza place.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah.
Patrick McEneaney : And so he was doing really well and, had done well for years. So he decided to open up two more. And, both of those pizza places failed for different reasons.
And it almost sank the original joint
Tyson E Franklin: because of resources.
Patrick McEneaney : Because of resources. And he had spent so much money building these places out and he just thought , Hey, this is just a rinse and repeat type of situation. You’ll see a McDonald’s out of business different places. You’ll see a Burger King out of business because , it is not just the framework.
You have to have the right market, the right people. There’s a lot that’s [00:40:00] involved in this. You can’t just open up or buy clinics and assume everything’s gonna run the same. We
Tyson E Franklin: had, we had a Taco Bell here in Cairns opened up it, I mean, the town was so excited when this Taco Bell was opening because everyone knew it was an American chain.
I don’t think it lasted a year. It was in a terrible spot that you really had to go outta your way to go there. So here’s a, a franchise that is world renowned. And just didn’t work. So sometimes opening up a clinic in some areas just won’t work.
Patrick McEneaney : Yeah. And, it’s really easy to, to get really excited about an opportunity of a new clinic.
Yeah. Trust me, I’ve done it a bunch of times and , I’ve had to, I, and then you look at the numbers and you go, uh, these aren’t where I wanted them to be.
Tyson E Franklin: But didn’t you find, look, I used to find probably, I used to find opening up a new clinic was the most exciting thing. I ever did. Finding the location, getting [00:41:00] it fitted out, getting it all set up, putting in all , the systems, employing the staff, and that first patient that came through the door was just the most exciting thing.
Patrick McEneaney : So exciting. It’s so exciting. I loved
Tyson E Franklin: it. It’s, I miss that so much that, that side of things. I really miss.
Patrick McEneaney : And you get the same rush every single time, every time it happens. It’s first clinic or the 16th.
Tyson E Franklin: Well, I think that’s what happened when some of my coaching clients, where they’ve been in one location, they’ve moved to another location.
I like, I am emotionally involved in this while they’re doing it. And when they have like an official opening you’re emotionally part of it. So yeah, that’s where I, get my hit from doing it that way now. Yeah. So Patrick, anything else you wanna share with us before we wrap up?
Oh, , how’s the Chicago Bears going?
Patrick McEneaney : They’re two and two right now.
Tyson E Franklin: Better if they were four and none. Four and zero, right?
Patrick McEneaney : Right. So, we’ll see. We’ll see. It’s not, it’s [00:42:00] not gonna be a Super Bowl championship year, but, uh, we’ll see what happens.
Tyson E Franklin: So, and I wanna point at everybody too, if you’re ever in the United States and there’s a NFL game going on, and you hear this thing called tailgating, just, just turn up at the stadium with a. A six pack’s not enough. Just turn it with 12 beers or 12, whatever you wanna drink, just rock up there and just throw it in somebody’s, uh, cooler as they call it over there and just enjoy the experience.
That was still one of my best mornings I’ve ever had. Can’t believe that earlier. Start.
Patrick McEneaney : Yeah, it’s uh, it’s a fun American ritual. , Everyone sits around and barbecues and has a couple beers and sits around and, , the energy’s great and the people are great. And, um, and then you get to go and, watch your team.
Tyson E Franklin: Yeah. That was so much. Um, okay, Patrick, on that note, I wanna thank you for coming back on the podcast. It won’t be your last visit for sure.
Patrick McEneaney : No, I’ll, I’ll be here
Tyson E Franklin: again, I’m sure. Okay. I’ll talk to you again [00:43:00] soon.