IQ Gets the Job. EQ Gets the Patients.
AQ Makes You Last.
Episode 39
David Gaspar, CEO of Smile Partners USA, exposes the hiring blind spot that's quietly killing dental careers: practices have obsessed over clinical skill and chairside personality for decades — but nobody's testing for the one quality that actually predicts whether a dentist survives the hard days. When the CBCT crashes, the assistant calls out sick, and patients are walking out the back door, IQ and EQ won't save you.
David calls it the Adversity Quotient (AQ) — and he argues that until the industry starts screening for it, recruiting will keep failing doctors, practices, and patients alike.
Key Revelations:
A high-AQ dentist who thrives under pressure is your best candidate for a turnaround office — but placing a low-AQ doctor there is setting everyone up to fail.
Even after selling a practice, doctors can't fully abdicate — Smile Partners still needs you to be a leader, not just a provider.
Culture isn't a mission statement on the wall — it's what happens when the day falls apart and everyone still knows exactly what to do
Most struggling practices don't have a process problem — they have a people problem, and no marketing budget or DSO support system fixes a team that can't handle adversity
The Hiring Formula Is Broken
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"Why do some DSOs grow revenue fast but never improve margins?"
Ken's answer: Growth mode means more expenses — more people, more marketing, more infrastructure. Margins don't disappear; they're just buried under expansion costs. The key is watching cash flow during the sprint, not profits. When growth levels out, real margins surface. But if you keep adding headcount and spending without discipline, you might never find out where you actually stand.
The "Ask Ken" Question:
Top 3 Episodes Of The Dental Truth Project. Listen Now!
(E. 3) How Associate Mismanagement Is Bankrupting Dental Groups - Eric Roman, Dental Associate Growth
(E.18) Why Half Your DSO Budget Is Disappearing Into Toxic Culture - Gabriel Hofmann, The Dental Efficiency Guy
(E.26) You Keep Losing Dental Team Members. Have You Asked Yourself Why? - Bonnie Thompson, Forest Family Dentistry
Can they perform the procedure? Do they have the technical skills?
This dominated hiring conversations for decades.
IQ — The Clinical Score
Three scores that predict a dentist's success:
EQ — The People Score
Can they connect with patients? Can they lead a team?
This became the next frontier of great hiring.
AQ — The Adversity Quotient
Can they handle a bad day? Do they take ownership when things go wrong?
This is the score nobody is testing for — and the one that decides everything.
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