Cheers Dave for coming over and coming onto the podcast! So just to start Dave can you tell us a bit about what attracted you to the mentorship in the first place?

Thanks for having me Shane, always good to be here. Before I joined I was speaking to Dave and it wasn’t really one big struggle, but I just felt everything could be a tighter – from how you greet clients, treat, the follow up etc. Everything was going okay but just wanted everything to be better. There’s always people you can learn from.

It’s a good point that, one of the things we get our therapists to do is list out all of the things they need to do to be successful and score themselves out of 10 – there’s always room for improvement! How did you first come across the mentorship?

I actually met Alan who was on the last podcast and he spoke about how good it was. From there I kept an eye on it and I suppose watched one video then with your marketing it kept popping up!

Haha yeah, once you see one video you are going to see more!

Yeah so it just kept popping up and then I saw it was reopening again, sent a message to Dave, and we had a chat from there.

What were your initial reservations?

Same as doing any course, if you’re going to invest in something you want to make sure it’s worth the money. And for me it wasn’t even about if I could make the money back but will it make me a better therapist. I saw some of the videos in the marketing and you guys were using some similar techniques to what I was already using, but obviously a bit differently. So I was wondering do I know this stuff? When I spoke to Dave about that I realised here’s a guy at the top of his game who’s learned from a lot of great people and he’s figured out a way to integrate all of this stuff into one system – which is what I was trying to do but he was just much more experienced.

So thinking back, can you remember your first impressions over the first couple of weeks – how did you find it?

Brilliant from the word go, even the whole support team. I had a problem logging in on the first day and sent an email and it was sorted in 2 minutes. The content is shot so well, there’s no fluff, so initial thoughts were brilliant. And anybody who knows yourself and Dave know that you always overdeliver.

It’s funny you say that, we look back on the content every year and we’ve just re-videod the whole thing again! We always get better at teaching it and try to streamline it so that it’s really applicable.

Yeah it’s a bit like your treatment sessions, you’re always trying to trim away the unnecessary and focus on what works. Not selling people short but just having things more streamlined.

Definitely. So what did you start to implement straight away and what results did you notice?

I’m somebody that has to implement straight away. I have to practice straight away. Literally I watched a video and I started implementing with the next client. And it’s not that your experimenting but you’re just coming to grips with it, and I’m confident that any client that comes in the door I can help them.

Yeah and experiment probably isn’t the right word, but it is a case of trial and error. So with the system it’s very easy to test, treat, then retest to see if you’re getting the desired result. So there’s real time feedback and if it’s not working you can move on straight away rather than spending a full session doing something and then realising it didn’t make a different.

Yeah and everybody’s nervous system is different. Like you say experiment is the wrong word but if your clinical reasoning is good, which the mentorship really helps with, you can usually be pretty confident what you’re doing is going to have a positive effect.

I think that’s it. The mentorship content / exercises are simple but it’s the reasoning behind it. From training our own staff in the clinic when people hit a roadblock it’s normally down to their clinical reasoning and not the system.

And even an exercise, if you’re struggling to coach and exercise to someone, it’s probably because you don’t understand what you want out of it.

100% and I think that’s something that we’re always improving on as therapists. So looking at your transformation from when you started the mentorship to now what’s the biggest difference?

I’m busier. Which is good. Things are a bit more streamlined – how I book people in, how I follow clients up etc all of that has got better. And that’s really down to the mentorship. Even though I’ve done a business and marketing degree in the past, it’s very hard to apply that stuff. So yeah I’m busier, I’m getting better results than ever, making more money than ever, and happier than ever in terms of the work I’m doing. I’m more relaxed, I feel like I have a good understanding of what’s going on so I’m confident I can help anyone.

That’s great. And that’s the main thing is to enjoy your job more. You’re happier, patients are happier, and everything else looks after yourself. Have you any advice for anybody thinking of starting the mentorship or not sure where to go next in terms of courses etc?

Generally I would always say invest in your education, and genuinely in terms of the mentorship it would have to go very, very wrong for you to not get value out of the mentorship. Even if you take your time going through it and not necessarily complete it in the 90 days. Even if it takes you 6 months, 12 months – the content is always there. If you’re unsure, message me, message yourself and Dave and just chat about it.

Yeah great point, and like any course you get out of it what you put in. We’re always streamlining our systems to make it as easy as possible to keep up with the content, and like you say it’s there forever. We’ve had some people who fell off the content initially but always go back on track eventually.

So what are your plans for the future Dave over the next 12 months?

Flying by the seam of the pants at the moment! As I said earlier I’m busy, trying to keep chipping away as I am, no major plans but just starting to think on the plane over where do I want to be in the next 5 years? Maybe not necessarily working in clinic 40-60 hours a week so maybe look at hiring somebody else – so yeah just see how it goes.

Well thanks for coming onto the podcast Dave, it’s been great having you and looking forwards to the refresher this weekend!

Always a pleasure!