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Welcome to What I Wish I Knew by Dental Head Start. This is a podcast where we learn from people that have been there, made the mistakes, learnt the lessons and have developed into the accomplished dental professionals they are today.
It’s your weekly mentoring session.
Team work makes the dream work… and means the dentist gets to go to the bathroom.
How much of what we do in a day of work is something that only we as dentists can strictly do? When you put everything down on a piece of paper, you may be surprised.
One of the major differences between experienced, successful dentists and newer graduates is that these dentists recognise early on that they only have one set of hands to help and serve patients, and that the only way to optimise the output of those hands is to leverage the power of their team.
In these episode of the podcast, systemisation and team leadership wiz Dr Cigdem Kipel, helps to unravel some of the nuances, challenges, but overwhelmingly the benefits of empowering and delegating to your dental team.
Tips to Takeaway for Tomorrow:
- 4:20 – How to get your team on-board – get their buy in to your vision
- 5:30 – Define your vision – your big picture purpose
- 7:00 – Find out the why of your team members – why do they come to work everyday, give them the pride and trust
- 8:40 – Change can start within the treatment room – identify what tasks can be completed competently by your staff, if only you took the time and effort to systemise it and train it
- 11:10 – An example of systemising the note taking process – get home on time!!
- 14:20 – We only have one set of hands, to optimise our output we need to leverage
- 16:20 – Empower and trust your team, help show them their importance and potential and that they are more than “just a dental assistant”
- 17:20 – Involve the team in developing practice systems and training
I know I learnt a lot in my chat with Cigdem, and really hope you do too. Let us know what you think about the new podcast!
Dr. Cigdem Kipel
Dr Cigdem Kipel is a passionate and inspiring Principal Dentist at a multi-award winning 7-surgery facility in Sydney. She is a confident and accomplished clinican with extensive training in implantology, digital CAD-CAM technology, orthodontic clear aligner therapy and aesthetic dentistry. However, her current passion lies in the non-clinical aspects of dental practice: patient communication, practice management, leadership and team development, systemisation technology and practice growth.
Outside of the clinic she is the CEO and founder Principle practice management software and Level-Up systemisation software, she is passionate about leveraging technology and creating cutting-edge digital systems to unlock greater case acceptance, utilise more of the dental team in a patient’s treatment journey and to generate unique opportunities to provide convenience and wow-factors to the patient at every step.
We got to know Cigdem a bit better.

Follow Dr Cigdem Kipel on social media for more excellent advice and check out her innovative practice management and systemisation tools
Also, look out for more tips from Cigdem coming out on the “What I Wish I Knew” Podcast soon!
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The Dental Head Start Podcast is for students and new graduates. We interview successful dentists and specialists to uncover the tips, tricks and advice to help you transition from dental school to private practice successfully.
If you like this content then I ask just one thing of you; share this with a friend who will benefit from this and help us help more students and new grads!