882 Dr Michelle Jorgensen:

Melinda Wittstock:

Coming up on Wings of Inspired Business:

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

I found another influencer in the area, and I said, can we develop a mouth care product, a tooth care product together? And she was very open to that, was excited about that. She already knew how to do it. She already had manufacturing connections. She already knew how to market, how to label, how to brand. She already had a warehouse. I look back now and think that was a crucial move. I just needed to partner with someone that already knew what they were doing. Now, we’ve been about two years in, and that product company has grown exponentially. And we have multiple products now. But I couldn’t have done it without her help.

Melinda Wittstock:

What does it take for we as women to get out of our comfort zones, simply ask for help and be open to receiving it? Business is all about relationship and collaboration, and today, Dr. Michelle Jorgenson shows how reaching out to someone who was already doing what she wanted to do, was the gamechanger that led to fast-scaling success and her ability to run not just one, but two successful businesses.

Melinda Wittstock:

Hi, I’m Melinda Wittstock and welcome to Wings of Inspired Business, where we share the inspiring entrepreneurial journeys, epiphanies, and practical advice from successful female founders … so you have everything you need at your fingertips to build the business and life of your dreams. I’m all about paying it forward a five-time serial entrepreneur, so this podcast is all about catalyzing an ecosystem where women entrepreneurs mentor, promote, buy from, and invest in each other …Because together we’re stronger, and we all soar higher when we fly together.

Melinda Wittstock:

Today we meet an inspiring entrepreneur, renowned holistic dentist, naturopath, and nutritionist who has merged her passion for well-being with innovative business practices that enable her to run several companies all at once.  Dr. Michelle Jorgenson is the founder and CEO of two businesses, Total Care Dentistry and Living Well with Dr. Michelle. Attracting patients from all over the world, and also rapidly scaling her health products, Michelle’s transformative journey into holistic medicine and entrepreneurship began when mercury exposure from traditional dentistry made her seriously ill.

Melinda Wittstock:

Today we talk about the tussle between health and hustle, and why as female founders, its vital we put our health first – and how we can do that and also scale fast-growing businesses. The secret? Collaboration, delegation, and proactive self-care.

Michelle will be here in a moment, and first,

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Melinda Wittstock:

How many times and in how many ways do we, as women founders, put our needs, and even our health, last on a long list of to-dos? I see you, sisters, and I know because I’ve been there, built that, five times now, and it’s taken me more than a minute to truly learn how to balance health with hustle and grow my own businesses without burnout.

Melinda Wittstock:

Today we’re talking health and wellbeing for female founders, and why it’s vital to collaborate, delegate and set up systems so your business can run without you having to do everything. Yes, this means asking for help. Receiving help. Letting go of that perfectionism gene.

Melinda Wittstock:

Like many entrepreneurs whose businesses were borne by overcoming a personal challenge, Dr. Michelle Jorgenson pioneered new holistic approaches to dentistry and wellness after mercury poisoning from traditional dentistry led to serious illness. After growing a holistic integrative dentistry practice that attracts patients from all over the world, she branched into all aspects of holistic care and wellbeing, and how runs two businesses as well as a foundation.

Melinda Wittstock:

So how does she do it, balancing all of that with four kids? We’re going to talk about the power of collaboration over competition, the power of setting intentions, the importance of documenting systems and processes, and of course, asking for help and letting yourself receive it. Plus, Dr. Michelle has everything so buttoned up that her businesses can run without her – so you’ll hear about her sabbatical plan as well.

Melinda Wittstock:

Let’s put on our wings with the inspiring Dr. Michelle Jorgenson and be sure to download the podcast app Podopolo so we can keep the conversation going after the episode.

[INTERVIEW]

Melinda Wittstock:

Michelle, welcome to Wings.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Melinda Wittstock:

Well, you’re a very busy entrepreneur because not only do you have your main business, you know, the dental care practice, but you spun out into doing a different related business at the same time. So, you’re running two?

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Yep.

Melinda Wittstock:

I’m just going to say, what’s that like?

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Well, it’s definitely busy, and I’ve learned a lot of things on the way, along the way on how to make it possible. It’s certainly something that you don’t do alone. And I think as women, a lot of times we just believe that we have to carry it all. And it can’t work if you do.

Melinda Wittstock:

That well, 100%, especially even in one business, let alone two. What was the spark that led to Living Well with Doctor Michelle?

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Well, I think that the whole thing does tie back to the dental office. I am a dentist, and I was practicing with my father for a few years. Thought that I would just work like he did forever. You know, he’s still in his seventies, still practices here and there. And I just thought that’s how it worked, that you picked your profession, you picked what we were going to do, and you just did it for the rest of your life. And about ten years into the practice, I started getting really sick.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

I didn’t know what it was. Of course, I did everything everybody else does, you know what, every doctor I could find, and I was in the industry myself, so I had a lot of good resources, a lot of friends that were working to help me. And really there were no answers. And my symptoms were really a lot of gut problems. I. But, you know, I thought, everybody has gut issues, don’t they? You know, that’s kind of what I think. You know, everybody has gut issues. I’m nothing new in this, but the big ones that were really life and practice altering were. I had numbness to the point that I couldn’t blow dry my hair, I couldn’t use a pen, I couldn’t. I couldn’t use my dental instruments. I couldn’t change out the instruments. They were too fine, fine tuned. My hands would work that way. And it was really, really painful. And then my memory was just shot. I couldn’t remember anything.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

And I’ve always had a very good memory, so I knew something was really, really wrong. So, I had my practice for sale. I didn’t think I was going to be able to continue practicing. And along the path to finding what my next thing was, someone said, have you considered that this might be mercury poisoning? And I said, oh, no, I don’t have any fillings. I knew that mercy, that fillings in the mouth, that silver fillings in the mouth had mercury in them, but I didn’t have any fillings. And this person said, it’s not the fillings you have, it’s the ones you’ve been drilling out for the last decade and breathing in all of the fumes. I’d never heard this, and I was a dentist, had been there for a decade, I’d never heard this. Started doing some research and found out this was a real thing, got tested, and it was mercury poisoning, off the charts.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

So, it made all the sense in the world as to why I was sick, because mercury poisons the neuron, the neurology, your neurology. My brain, my memory, my numbness, all of those things fit. I had to change the way I was doing dentistry in order to take care of myself. The doctor said, well, you can’t get it out if you keep putting it in. So, I had to change the way I was doing dentistry. I changed a lot. And all of a sudden, doctors started reaching out, saying, well, do you do this as well? We’ve heard that dentistry could impact health this way, and, you know about this, and I didn’t know anything that they were telling me, so I’d have to go and research and find, you know, resources. And there wasn’t really a place to go for any of this at that time.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

So, I’d have to go to these obscure places and learn all of these things. And honestly, a lot of it was for my own health. I wanted to improve, you know, to get well. But then I started realizing there is so much potential here for me to help other people with their health as well. So I went back to school, became a naturopath, and started attracting patients that really needed answers. They needed answers to health. It moved beyond just doing fillings to how can that filling affect you, and how can I actually help you with these other chronic diseases and things that you are suffering from relating to dentistry? And it was something I just never even considered was a possibility. And along those lines, as that started growing and building.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

The practice started growing, we started attracting patients from all over the world, and all sorts of things started taking off. And people started saying, well, how can we find the things you’re telling me about? How can we find these resources? Do you have a place where it’s all written down? Do you have a book? Do you have. So really this Living Well, as Dr. Michelle came because people asked me to do it. They just said, we want this information somewhere. Can you please put a place where we can learn how to cook, how to use food the right way, how to use real food in our home, simply how to garden, how to grow our own food? You tell us to do it, but where do we learn how? So that’s what Living Well Dr. Michelle is, is really the thing that grew from a need inside of my other business. And that has since now taken on a life of its own. And we have a pretty extensive product line, a lot of social influence in regards to it. And I just got a book deal with a big publisher, publishing along these same lines, not about dentistry, but about health and energy production and how we have more energy.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

And so, it’s really all just been a development. And, you know, if you’d asked me clear back in 2001 when I started the dental practice, if I’d be where I was today, there is no, no way I could have fathomed any of it. It grew as the need arose and I was open to the change that it took to become that person. So that’s really the story of the whole thing.

Melinda Wittstock:

I am struck by how many women come on this podcast and a real impetus for their entrepreneurial journey and their innovation in whatever business is the fact that they got sick? I’m curious what you think about this. Is it because women try to fit themselves into a very male paradigm of the hustle and the grind, and combined with our own acculturation that we think we have to do it all? Like, almost every female entrepreneur I know has had some sort of health crisis at age 30, 40, 50, something like that.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Yeah, I don’t. I don’t know if the health crisis is a symptom of the business world or if the health crisis is just such a large enough push that it gives you the momentum you need to build a business around it. You know, I don’t know if it’s the chicken or the egg. I don’t know.

Melinda Wittstock:

It’s an interesting one. I find, like, a lot of people have a lot of different theories about it, but I just do find it so prevalent among female founders. And so, what is it that’s actually causing that? Is it just part of the entrepreneurial journey, or is it like, we have to get sick to become entrepreneur? You know what I mean? It’s odd.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Well, there is one interesting thing. As I’ve gone through this health journey of my own, I have learned, in fact, there’s one practitioner that I’ve visited that was a friend of mine, and I said, it seems like women are more sick than men. Is this true? You know, and, I mean, obviously, I see patients every single week, so, you know, and I, and I would say that the predominant number of patients that I’m seeing are women, maybe 60 40, maybe even 70 30. You know, I’m seeing more women that are, that are sick than men. And he explained it in a way. He said, you know, women are, their bodies are finely tuned. There’s a lot of hormones and a lot of inner workings that have to work correctly to make things go, whereas men are kind of like an old Ford pickup truck, and, you know, they’ve got just a little dial here and a little dial there, and it’s just not as hard to keep them finely tuned.

Melinda Wittstock:

I guess we’re more complex. Just even the way our brains…

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Exactly. We are more complex. So, I think there’s more things that can go wrong. Does that tie into entrepreneurship? I don’t know. I think it does give us something to talk about and something that allows us to use that journey as a pivot point for what we then want to do.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yeah, I mean, it’s not only the type of business that we want to do, but who we’re being in that business, you know, how we balance and our own health and wellness, because if, you know, if we’re not healthy and, well, it’s very difficult to run a great business. And I see so many women, and I know I experienced this early, earlier in my life, where you just are giving so much to so many people and doing so many things that you end up sort of serving out of an empty cup. Like a lot of women sort of put themselves last in the equation rather than first. There’s some sort of guilt or we think we’re selfish or something for prioritizing our own well-being.

Melinda Wittstock:

You’ve got two businesses, a lot of stuff to juggle. So how do you balance that? What’s your daily routine like?

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

This is something I have definitely learned the hard way. And so, I’m glad to share it with others to perhaps help them not learn quite as difficult, difficult as way as I did. I learned that I had to do a lot of self-preservation, and I do it in a couple of different ways. The first thing I do is I have become a master delegator, and I simply cannot do everything that comes across, across my plate. I can’t. So, I’ve created a network of people that I surround myself with that I can ask to do things. And what I found, sometimes we think, oh, that’s beneath them, or they wouldn’t want to do that, and that’s wrong. Everybody wants to help in their own way, whatever it might be.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

So, the very first question I ask now, when something comes across my plate, is, who can do this for me? And that might sound a little, you know, sometimes I thought, oh, gosh, I’m not above these, you know, these activities. I had to change my mindset. It’s not that at all. It’s that I’m preserving my health to do the things that are absolutely most important. I’ve had to make a list, literally make a list for myself. What things do I do? And there are things that only I do. It’s some things that people may say, well, you could outsource, but I love to do it. I love to cook dinner for my family, so I cooked dinner for my family. Some other women may not love to cook at all, so that may not be on their list. But there is a list of things that I do, and there are things.

Melinda Wittstock:

That I always try and pass that off, and that’s fine. It’s kind of enjoyable on Thanksgiving or Christmas, but…

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

That’s a personal list. Do you know what I mean? But I think making the list is important. What are things that only you can do? And then you find someone else to do everything else. So that’s number one thing I do for preservation. The second thing I do for preservation is I don’t allow myself to get too emotionally invested into problems anymore. I used to get so buried in this. In fact, I just had a thing that I probably would have been sleepless for days with. Doesn’t happen.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Just this week, another practitioner that said, everything you do is snake oil, and I’m going to report you to the board. And I would have been sleepless for days about that in the past. And this time I laughed, and I said, great, because I have some things to report about you as well. I hope the call soon. And I didn’t allow myself to think about it for another moment because I don’t have the time to spend emotional energy on things that aren’t worth it. Does that make sense?

Melinda Wittstock:

Oh, gosh. Okay, so what you just said is so profound because I think we can get so easily bogged down and all that stuff. And just even if your mind is obsessing with those things in and of itself is going to make you sick, you know?

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Yeah.

Melinda Wittstock:

Show up in your body in some way. And I think the entrepreneurial journey sort of teaches you that, because the only way to survive, like, you know, because there’s so many, well, there’s so many things that come out of left field, things you can’t control, haters, just all this kind of weird stuff. And if you let all that stuff get to you, you’ll never get anywhere. So, you have to figure out a way to walk through all that.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

And really what I finally realized is they weren’t feeling all this distress. They weren’t feeling it like this doctor would feel none of this distress. So, it wasn’t affecting him at all. So, if this was all my feelings, feeling I was justified and he was so wrong and, you know, all of these things, that doesn’t hurt him at all. He is not even affiliated with those feelings. It’s all me. I was hurting myself. I was making myself sick and it had nothing to do with the other person, so why in the world would I choose that?

Melinda Wittstock:

Exactly. I think we take on, maybe it’s the kind of motherhood gene, we take on a lot of responsibility for other people and other things that aren’t our own. So, talk to me about your process of how you got, in effect, really good emotional boundaries around all that stuff. What was the process and how long actually did it take you? Because it is a process to get clear on these things.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

It’s very much a process. You know, the thing that’s really catapulting this change for me currently is I, like I said, I had this, I have this book deal and I have a very, very tight writing deadline. I have to write 7,000 words a week. And if I don’t, I don’t meet my deadline, it’s just not going to happen. And so, I had to look at everything and say, do I even have time to think about that? I don’t. Otherwise, my bigger priority won’t happen. And I think that getting clear on the bigger priority is the key.

[PROMO CREDIT]

Wings of Inspired Business is brought to you by the new podcast, Zero Limits Business Growth Secrets. Join me together with Steve Little – serial entrepreneur, investor and mergers & acquisitions maestro – as we explore the little-known 24 value drivers that spell the difference between a $5m business, and a $50mm even $500 mm business. That’s Zero Limits Business Growth Secrets, produced by Podopolo Brand Studio at zerolimitsradio.com – that’s zerolimitsradio.com and available wherever you get your podcasts.

Melinda Wittstock:

And we’re back with Dr. Michelle Jorgenson, founder of Total Care Dentistry and Living Well with Dr. Michelle.

[INTERVIEW CONTINUES]

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

I have a son who really struggles in life. We adopted him when he was two and a half, and it’s been, he’s 18 now, and I’ll just say those are the hardest 16 years of my life with him because it’s been a struggle ever since the day he joined our family. I love him to pieces, and I would not choose to not have him there, but it has been so much, so many hard things that I just didn’t even know how to deal with. And I got so emotionally invested in these problems. I had so many health concerns that I can trace directly back to this now. And now something huge just came up, like in the last two days. And I looked at him and I realized, I just talked to myself. I said, you know what? He doesn’t have to earn your love.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

It’s there regardless. And is this worth you getting upset about? Because he won’t feel it. And so, my mantra now is, be still. I just told myself, I said, be still. Change anything when you get upset, so be still. It’s going to preserve the relationship. It’s going to preserve your own health. Just be still. It’s a lot of inner talk.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yeah. I mean, everything in entrepreneurship and life generally comes down to mindset. Like, we kind of get what we’re thinking. So perhaps about some sort of problem. It’s almost like we prolong it rather than let it, letting it kind of pass through us, if that makes sense.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Yep. Yep. Just be still.

Melinda Wittstock:

Interesting. Okay, so tell me about Living Well with Doctor Michelle. What do you do? Who does it help? Tell me about that business.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

It started with education, and I started writing books. And they were interesting. It was a lot of information that I was sharing to other audiences for, for one reason or another. And they would say, gosh, I wish this were in a book. So, I would sit down, and I would write a book, self-publish it, created a book. So that was really the first impetus for Living Well. I started doing classes. I have an education here.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

We have a homestead and education center. And so, we started doing classes. And what I realized is that one on one classes are fabulous, and I love them. And maybe that’s the model that people choose, but I just, it was limiting the number of people I was able to touch and help. I knew I had to do something outside of just sitting here in a class and teaching 20 people, you know, and the amount of energy, it’s one of those things, too, where I would look at it and think, okay, what is the return? And return for me isn’t dollars. I don’t even really care about dollars. It’s about influence. It’s about people that I’m able to help.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

My whole mission is to help people live well by finding their own purpose, basically, their own beauty, their own thing that they. That they’re meant to do. And if I’m only helping 20 people, does that serve my mission? And then my answer was no. For others, it might be yes, but my answer was no. That doesn’t serve my mission if I’m only helping 20 people this week, and if the work that I had to put into helping those 20 people was exponential in relation to the number of people I helped. I had to decide, is there a different way to do this? I started going on to social platforms and just sharing little snippets, little things, and was surprised at how interested people were in that. So, all of a sudden, now, the number of people I was able to help expand it, and then they started asking for products. Well, you talk about this, and you say that we should avoid this or have this.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Well, do you have a product? And so, I dipped my toes. I found another influencer in the area that, that I already had gone, moved into product development. And I said, can we develop a mouth care product, a tooth care product together? And she was very open to that, was excited about that, which, that was really a key move for me. She already knew how to do it. She already had manufacturing connections. She already knew how to market, how to label, how to brand. She already had a warehouse. You know, she already had some of those things.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

And so that was really key. I look back now and think that was a crucial move. I just needed to partner with someone that already knew what they were doing. Now, we’ve been about two years in, and that product company has grown exponentially. And we have multiple products now. We are now doing our own manufacturing, our own storage, our own fulfillment, our own everything. But I couldn’t have done it without her help. And sometimes I feel like women, I think, are much less prone to this, but men, I think they think, well, what am I giving away and partnering with someone? And, you know, we’ve paid, we have a partnership percentage on these products that we co-branded.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

And sometimes we pay her, sometimes I pay, she pays me. You know, we pay each other for sales, and sometimes you get caught up thinking, well, how much am I losing in having to pay that profit share? And instead, I look at it and say, how much have I gained in.

Melinda Wittstock:

You’re growing a bigger pie.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

So much bigger pie. And if you focus on the small piece, you’re never going to grow anything.

Melinda Wittstock:

Well, this is the difference between scarcity and abundance thinking. A lot of people fall into this scarcity mindset because it’s born of fear. And when we’re coming from a place of fear, it’s very difficult to grow anything big. And so, what are all those win-win collaborations? I think the key thing that you did that is really important. I want everybody to really hear is seek out a person who has already succeeded at what you want to do, and the people who are best at it tend to be the most generous, the most abundance minded.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Yes, I agree.

Melinda Wittstock:

You know, and a lot of people don’t do that. They sort of think that they can’t, they don’t kind of qualify to talk to this person who’s already succeeding, or they think they have to do it themselves. But when we collaborate, yeah, we make a bigger piece. I mean, that’s of a really, really important lesson, I think, for all entrepreneurs, particularly women entrepreneurs, because I think we’re good at collaborating when we get out of our own way.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Yep. And I have an interesting example, and this honestly is fueled by a friend of mine and her even bigger example. Well, I’ll share my friend’s example first. She was working in lean management and was really interested in a particular author’s book and some of the concepts he was teaching. And she thought, you know what, I’m just going to reach out to him, the author, which we think that they, we can’t do things like that, you know. So, she emailed the author, started asking questions about the principles, about all the things, started sharing some of what she was doing, and he asked her to co-author his next book. She was an unknown author. She had nothing, no experience with this whatsoever.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

She co-authored the next book and it had catapulted her business, her career, forever just because of that one email. So, using that as an example in the book I’m writing now, I knew I wanted a certain kind of illustration. And I kept looking at another book that I just love. I love the visual look of this book. And I kept reaching out to people on, like, Upwork and Fiverr and saying, can you create some illustrations like this? And finally, I went, why don’t I just ask the illustrator that did the book I love? So, I found a contact in the book. I started talking with her assistant, and I’ve now contracted to have this illustrator illustrate my book. And we just think that it’s not possible. But it is.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Like you said, people are generous. She was like, oh, I love what you’re doing. Absolutely. I would be thrilled to do this for you. Just ask. And I tell my kids this all the time, that if you don’t ask, you already have a no. So, what have to lose to ask? Because if you get a no, you already have a no. But if you get a yes. Amazing.

Melinda Wittstock:

Another way of saying this is you miss 100% of the shots that you don’t take.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Yep.

Melinda Wittstock:

And so, what’s there to lose, you know? Nothing. Yeah, you’ve already lost if you don’t ask. Women really struggle with asking, but also receiving, like, being open to actually receiving the help. Was it a hard thing for you just to, like, open up to, like, yes, I’m going to take this help, I’m going to say thank you for this person who just complimented me. I’m going to acknowledge, like, my own accomplishments.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Yeah, I think that that’s something that women particularly struggle with. And so, yes, from the compliment standpoint, for sure, it’s. It’s always funny. Now, just yesterday, I was seeing a full day of new patients in my practice, and one lady, I walked in, she said, oh, my gosh, I’m standing next to you. I can’t believe I’m standing next to you. I just love you so much. You know, it’s always a little awkward. I’m like, oh, well, I’m just glad you’re here, you know? I mean, I’m not ever quite sure what to say, but, I mean, how.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

How beautiful, you know? And so, I just gave her a little hug and said, I’m just so grateful you’re here, too. I can’t believe I’m standing next to you either. You know, I think that there’s ways to do it very gracefully that don’t feel awkward. I think we’re always a little worried about that awkwardness. You know, this is a little awkward, feels a little weird. I just usually embrace it, embrace them, embrace it, whatever it might be. But that compliment piece, let’s own it. And then asking and receiving help from others is still a challenge. And I always, I think women, we default into the doer mode because we’re good at it. You know, we’re really great doers, so.

Melinda Wittstock:

We default to it.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Yeah.

Melinda Wittstock:

So like, I know this about myself and yet I still find myself falling into that because it’s kind of like a think, oh, it’ll just be faster to do it myself or whatever that, whatever that is.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Right.

Melinda Wittstock:

Sometimes it is.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

It’s like, but then it doesn’t get you any further forward. So, it’s kind of like, you know, saving a penny to or say, you know, say saving a penny to not earn a dime. It didn’t make any sense. Well, yeah.

Melinda Wittstock:

There’s so much research that shows that in business, women tend to stay in small business longer than they need to because they don’t hire soon or fast enough. What was your trajectory with that in terms of building your team and some of the challenges that you faced, not only personally but just in terms of managing the team, did you hire early enough? You know, what was your experience with that?

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

You know, there’s a seminal book called the E-Myth that probably a lot of people listening to this have read before.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yes, yeah, yeah.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

In that story, that’s the story, you know, is this woman who runs a pie shop, and she knows she has to hire, so she hires, and she lets go of the reins and she’s so happy and then everything falls apart and then she just goes back to making the pies herself again. So, I think that that’s always our fear that it’s not going to go the way we would do it, so we can’t let go. But here’s the thing. It’s not going to go the way you would do it. That’s just the truth of it. However, you have to create that priority list. Which things do I care the most about? So, for example, we are building a new wing in our practice.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

And in the past, I’ve been the one that got all the artwork for the walls. I was the one that picked out the colors and all of these kinds of things. And in this new wing, I simply don’t have time. And so, I asked my business manager to do it for me. I walked in, saw the artwork she chosen, and I don’t like it. I don’t love it. But you know what I said to myself? Doesn’t matter. Does it matter? It doesn’t matter.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

So, how much time did it save for me to not do it? So, the genesis or the trajectory for me building this team was me getting out of my own way and saying, gosh, I don’t have all the best ideas in the whole entire universe. I don’t have the best eye for art in the whole entire universe. You know, I don’t. Everybody else has things that they can contribute. And what’s the bigger goal here? Do I want to be working until 11:00 at night and up at five in the morning? Do I want to give up time with my kids? Do I want to give up my weekends? Do I want to do that? Is it worth it to have a say in the artwork on the walls?

Melinda Wittstock:

No, because if everything is important, then nothing is important.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Yep, you got it. And you can’t do everything. So, I had to slowly start giving things to people and trusting them that they could do it and getting out of my own way. One of my coaches, she told me this, and it was absolutely the truth. I was complaining to her. I actually partnered with another woman a couple of years ago. I had been a sole owner until that time, and this was a large business, so it was difficult to do that. And finally, I partnered with another woman, another dentist, and I was complaining to my coach, saying she’s just not pulling her weight.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

And she said, have you stepped aside and allowed her to step up? And I had to think about that.

Melinda Wittstock:

Creating space for other people and creating space for them to make mistakes, too, because, I mean, entrepreneurship is, if nothing else, it’s about failing forward. And as long as you’re learning, people are going to make mistakes or do something kind of, you know, maybe a little bit different than what you wanted, but if there’s clarity of leadership, clarity of priorities like you’re talking about, and then you give people the chance to fail, but also a system in which everybody can collectively learn from that, right?

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

And I think that that system is the key. And that’s what’s often not built inside of a small business that’s growing because it takes time. It takes time to document systems. It takes time to even sit down and think in your head, what do I do when I do this? You know, it’s just part of our being and we don’t have to think about it. So, documenting it is challenging. And honestly, it’s often the part that entrepreneurs dislike the most. It’s boring. I hate it.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

And so, I have to discipline myself. I have to just say, you know what? I’m going to spend an hour on this and I’m going to. It’s going to suck. Like it just is, but I’m going to do it. And then I get to go do something I want to do after that. And that documentation, those, that system of creation has been so crucial, and me being able to hand the reins to others. But here’s a little key. With that systems creation, you don’t actually have to do it yourself entirely.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

What I will do is sometimes we videotape, so we videotape myself doing it or someone else on the team doing it. And the person that we’re training and asking, you know, handing that system off to then watches the videotape and creates documentation for them. It’s kind of exciting because it’s new and they’re learning and, you know, it’s a growth process for us. It’s just drudgery. So, they create that, or they just watch what you do, and they follow you around and they create basically a playbook based on what you’re doing that way as well. They can ask questions; you can clarify as you’re going. So, it’s not you sitting in front of a computer going, okay, what do I do when I do that? Because you don’t really remember it. I use a lot of co creation in these systems creation processes, and they are allowed to ask as many questions as they want. Nothing’s dumb. You know, we assume that people can understand us when that’s really an incorrect assumption.

Melinda Wittstock:

A lot of times we all assume that. Like, we all, we all assume it’s easy. If it’s easy for you, it’s like, oh, it must be easy for everybody else.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Exactly. So, I think handing off and creating a team, you cannot forget the part about documentations and systems creation. You have to do it along with delegation.

Melinda Wittstock:

I love the idea of just videoing yourself and, and passing it off. Whether you have like a executive assistant or a chief of staff or somebody on your team that shadows you, in effect. I mean, I think in the early days of Amazon, that’s what Jeff Bezos did, right. He had what he called his shadow. And his shadow, I think, was vital to his success because it was really getting all the systems in place that would allow for rapid scale. If you think of how fast that scaled, it’s because they had the systems in place to be able to do that. So, like, when it comes time to say you’re in a big growth trajectory, a lot of companies and startups in that big growth phase falter there.

Melinda Wittstock:

It’s kind of like a very dangerous moment because they’re growing so fast. It’s chaos in that situation. You can make bad hiring decisions or people don’t know what they’re doing. You can burn cycles, you can like just mess it up so easily.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Yeah.

Melinda Wittstock:

You know, so planning, depending on the business and what that growth trajectory is, but finding that kind of trusted person, and even if you don’t have the money for that trusted person yet, like, I think your system is a really great way to do it. Like really sit down. What do you want to do? What are you, what is, what are the things that only you can do, like, in your zone of genius and what are the things that someone else could do as well as you or better than you? You know, hopefully.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Right.

Melinda Wittstock:

Like, so hire your weaknesses.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Yep. Yep.

Melinda Wittstock:

So, you’re busy writing a book, which is exciting. And you mentioned the kind of 7,000 words a week. How’s all that going?

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Well, it’s hard. It’s hard. And it’s funny because I’m a book lover, so I love to read books. And now I look at every book and I look at every word and I have a lot more appreciation for it. I think someone had to write that three times. Every single word, someone had to write three times. So, it’s a lot of work, but it’s, it’s my life’s work, you know, I know what it is now that I need to do, and I need to share, and that’s been a process as well. I, I decided, well, I’ve written five books, but they’ve all been self-published books, and they’re all a little bit more like a manual, I would say this is very, very much a departure.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

And I knew I wanted to do this with a traditional big publisher, but I didn’t know how to do that. So, I started asking around. I started reaching out. I talked to a few different book agents, and some were excited about it, some weren’t. But I knew what I wanted. And I think that that’s the key to entrepreneurship as well, is just knowing and deciding. I’ve spun my wheels for years on things because I never decide that I really want it. And what I find is, as soon as you want it, all of a sudden everything just comes in front of you, and you recognize it, and you see it and you can grab it.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

So, the book agent joined my team. She was able to guide me through the writing process, through the book sales process, to publishers, all of that. And now I’m sitting back and I’m thinking, whoa, I have a publishing deal. That’s kind of crazy. But I wanted it, and that’s what I was going to get, and so I did. And that’s, I think it’s just deciding. That’s the key.

Melinda Wittstock:

It is deciding. And to a large degree, it’s also kind of envisioning opening yourself up to even spotting things. I mean, this goes back to the doing. If we’re so busy doing, we don’t even spot the opportunity.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Yep. Yep. We get so bogged in the doing when the doing could be done by someone else most often.

Melinda Wittstock:

You know what’s really interesting about that, right? Because when you set an intention, right, and then you let go of it, like, you know, you set it, you envision it and whatnot, and then you dis-attach from the outcome. I find that that’s very powerful because suddenly all the opportunities present. Like, for instance, I know that my next act has always been, you know, you know, first of all, building my AI and blockchain podcasting company to big exit and all that kind of stuff, which I’m sort of like busy, busy, busy, busy with at the moment and where that’s going. But I always wanted to invest in female founded startups and companies, particularly those that have a social impact or doing great things in the world. And I’ve been thinking about this for a long time. This was the impetus for even doing this podcast, catalyze this ecosystem of women who genuinely are supporting, supporting each other, investing in each other, buying from each other, mentoring each other, excuse me, and such. And then all of a sudden, out of the blue, I’ve been approached to create a fund. And so, it didn’t come on my timeline, you know what I mean? It wasn’t like because I had this kind of idea of this linear timeline.

Melinda Wittstock:

Like, I’m going to exit out Podopolo and then I’ll do this. But then, like you, the opportunity presents and ignore it, or do you seize it? Right. But just even being, being open to it, it’s interesting how that comes about.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Yeah. Being open, being, giving yourself enough time to recognize it when it arrives. And then I think also giving yourself the permission to say, that’s what I’m going to do now. And it’s okay if these other things aren’t my priority anymore. You know, my personality is such that I love to start things. And, and in the past, I really kind of took a beating for that. That was a, that was a fault that, you know, people would look at me and say, gosh, you just, you just aren’t great at finishing anything.

Melinda Wittstock:

Oh, man, I’ve had people say that to me, too, because I’m a real starter. I love that aspect.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Totally. Yeah, that’s, that’s the best. And now I say, absolutely, you are right. I am amazing at starting things and getting things brought to life. There are so few people who can do that. But you know how many people can finish stuff? So many. And I get to employ a whole bunch of them now.

Melinda Wittstock:

Yeah, exactly. I need finishers.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Exactly. Right. Because there are few that have the guts to start. And if you’re one of those that has the guts to start, then keep looking forward. Don’t worry about all the stuff behind you. Hire people that can take care of all those pieces.

Melinda Wittstock:

It’s like knowing yourself, knowing your zone of genius, leaning into that, you know?

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Yep.

Melinda Wittstock:

So, you’ve got your book coming out next year. How do you see your dental practice growing and also at the same time, Living Well with Doctor Michelle. Where do you want to be in like five years’ time?

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

I already have a very big deadline, a hard stop for myself. My husband and I are actually going to serve a mission for our church starting in December of 2025. I’ve been working for five years toward that. And I think that’s a key for goals as well, is setting them far enough out and not necessarily knowing every step that it’s going, that it’s going to need to get there. That’s a big fault I have. Like, I sometimes I want to know everything that’s going to happen and exactly what things are going to look like before I start? Well, you can’t. Like, you literally cannot.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

It’s impossible to. But I knew December 2025 that I wanted to have a sabbatical for a year. I knew this. So, I’ve been planning this for five years. Well, it will be five years by that date, by since 2020, we’ve been planning this and making moves to make it possible, because I have two very large businesses that I run, and I. There’s a lot of things that have to happen for me to be able to step away for a year. So that’s my next step. But when I return from that sabbatical, what I want to do is I want to show, and I’ve said this for forever, I love video, I love to present, and I want to show where we teach people how to live well, what does that look like from a day to day, on a day to day standpoint, day to day basis, what do we feed ourselves? What do we do? How do we utilize the elements of the earth? Everything that we’re surrounded with? What do we sleep on? What do we breathe? What do we drink like, what does that look like? And I want to teach people, massively teach people. So, I’m putting it out there now, you know, there will be a living well show.

Melinda Wittstock:

That’s so good because you put it out there, by the time you get back, you’re going to have all kinds of ideas, by the way, while you’re on your sabbatical.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Exactly.

Melinda Wittstock:

Well, what’s the best way, Michelle, for people to find you, work with you get access to your products, all the different things.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

So, there’s two websites. Livingwellwithdoctormichelle.com is the first one. And that’s where you’re going to find a lot of education on all things health-based, as well as products, information about books, all those kinds of things. And then if anyone’s interested in our kind of, what I call health-based dentistry, that’s totalcaredental.com. And there are all sorts of free resources everywhere. I’m just about teaching people and helping people live well. So, if that just means you go and watch a YouTube video or go and watch one of my reels on Instagram or whatever it might be, everything’s under Living Well with Dr, Michelle. Go there, watch it, learn, and hopefully it helps you live well.

Melinda Wittstock:

Wonderful. Well, thank you so much for putting on your wings and flying with us today.

Dr. Michelle Jorgensen:

Thank you. I appreciate the opportunity.

[END INTERVIEW]

Melinda Wittstock:

Dr. Michelle Jorgenson is the founder of Total Care Dentistry and Living Well with Dr. Michelle. Be sure to download Podopolo, follow Wings of Inspired Business there, create and share your favorite moments with our viral episode clip feature, and join us in the episode comments section so we can all take the conversation further with your questions and comments.

Melinda Wittstock:

That’s it for today’s episode. Head on over to WingsPodcast.com – and subscribe to the show. When you subscribe, you’ll instantly get my special gift, the WINGS Success Formula. Women … Innovating … Networking … Growing …Scaling … IS the WINGS of Inspired Business Formula …for daily success in your business and life. Miss a Wings episode? We’ve got hundreds in the vault, all with actionable advice and epiphanies. Check them out at MelindaWittstock.com or wingspodcast.com. You can also catch me on LinkedIn or Instagram @MelindaAnneWittstock. We also love it when you share your feedback with a 5-star rating and review on Apple, Spotify or wherever else you listen, including Podopolo where you can interact with me and share your favorite clips.