Navigating the Chiropractic Profession: Insights from Kevin Christie
In this conversation, Kevin Christie shares his journey from being a clinically focused chiropractor to becoming a successful entrepreneur and coach in the chiropractic field. He discusses the importance of clinical competence, the transition to business, and the role of marketing in building a successful practice. Kevin emphasizes the need for chiropractors to understand their patient experience and the financial aspects of running a practice. He also reflects on the challenges faced in the profession and offers advice for new chiropractors and those struggling in their careers. The conversation concludes with insights into the future of chiropractic and the impact of AI on the profession.
Full Transcript
Well, how you been? How's practice?
Kevin Christie (00:29.761)
Good, good. Yeah. Everything's rolling along, getting through the summer. Summer down here in South Florida is always a little slower, but it's good.
Beau Beard (00:38.444)
Yeah. Yeah. Well, let's jump into this, man. So, I've obviously known of you for a long time. have we ever met in person? Yeah. That's what was kind of trying to think we had. I know we were running some same circles too much not to, so we'll have to make that happen. But, you've been in practice for what? Going on two decades? Yeah. Well, congrats. Just experience. Yeah.
Kevin Christie (00:41.996)
Mm-hmm.
Kevin Christie (00:48.913)
No, I don't think so. We'll have to do that at some point.
Kevin Christie (00:56.631)
Yeah.
Kevin Christie (01:01.527)
I'm in my 20th, yeah, getting old. Thank you. Yeah.
Beau Beard (01:08.586)
It's Patina. So you've been, have you been in practice in South Florida the entire time?
Kevin Christie (01:14.965)
Yep, I have. And I'm originally from down here.
Beau Beard (01:18.016)
Okay. So, and you know, the whole premise of this season is, know, how did clinical expertise lead to business success? And then how did that catapult you, you know, whether into just retirement or other ventures. And obviously I kind of am abreast to what you're doing, but if we go take a step back from this 20th year, if we're years one to three, maybe five in practice, what did that look like? Like, what was the practice?
looking like, what was your focus both in the practice and outside of the practice to grow it. Just kind of give me a general rundown on what those first few years looked
Kevin Christie (01:53.109)
Yeah, no, absolutely. I graduated in the December of five and I worked as an associate, had a really good internship that, that turned into a job and, and did that for about a year and a half. I'll say, you know, back then I was very clinically minded, right? I was all in on the, on the clinical, you know, back then I, Brett Winchester and I have talked about this, you know, if you had palpation and manipulation and you had some rehab,
maybe the Craig Levinson stuff back then, ART, were kind of the, you you were pretty well-tooled as a sports chiropractor, let's call it. And so I had all those things and was really focused on treating athletics and golf as a real sub-niche, was doing the TPI stuff with Greg Rose.
And was just, you know, I'll say I was, I was, I was deep in the clinical, but I was also doing things out in the community as much as I could. And I was even doing things like toast masters to work on public speaking. And I was working events. was hosting stuff at our, at our clinic. I was just getting out there a lot. Cause again, this would have been, you know, this call 2006, you weren't, there wasn't social media marketing. Um, so you, had to, you kind of had to get out there. And so I was in.
And then I was, uh, I kept on running into this other chiropractor who was doing things as well. And he was maybe, I don't know, eight years older than me or so had a practice down in Miami and he had an opportunity in Davie, Florida, which is, it's a, it's a just a little west of Fort Lauderdale. And there was a sports training facility there and this particular chiropractor got the opportunity to rent space out of there, but he didn't have the time to do it. So he, kept on approaching me to partner with him.
to run that and, ultimately I did in, middle summer of 2007. So I guess I'm now a year and a half into it. I took that opportunity. I had a good, good paying associate job, but I took the opportunity to go out on, you know, in a partnership and, and fortunately there was a ton of pro athletes training there, like high level ones. And, yeah, I did that for a few years and just got a lot of repetitions on working with.
Kevin Christie (04:14.775)
high level athletes and going to the NFL combine starting in 2008. And that I kept doing that all the way until 2020. So yeah, that first three years was just about getting as good as I could clinically and getting out in the community as much as possible. I don't think I ever assumed people were just going to knock on my door. And there was a lot of strategic byproducts from just getting out there quite a bit. And so that's kind of what the first few years looked like.
Beau Beard (04:42.19)
So what was the driver of being so clinically oriented? I've talked to a lot of people on the show and a lot of times it can be a bit selfish or vain like, I want to be the smartest person in the room or the best chiro in my town. Or did you know from the get go, like I want to be clinically competent but maybe there'll be a time where like I'm going to pivot. Yeah, what was the motivation? What was the driver for that upfront?
Kevin Christie (05:08.459)
Yeah, I was a baseball player growing up. And I always say I was a really good high school baseball player that could have made a drastic mistake and try to continue it into community college and wasted a lot of time. Cause I wasn't going to be a pro baseball player. I'm very clear on that. But it was good enough to where I was glad I made the right decision and got an education. And I went to Florida state university as an exercise physiology major. Cause I actually did know, I think my senior year of high school, knew I wanted to
to become a chiropractor. And I, you know, I went to Florida state exercise physiology was really enjoying it. I, I matriculated in from 1998 to 2002 at Florida state. And we're really good at athletics. And I was also on the strength conditioning team there as like an assistant intern and was working with all of the athletics except for football and except for baseball. had their own strength conditioning departments, but I was working with all the other athletes.
And I really enjoyed that and I really enjoyed seeing how hard they worked and the difference it made by helping them out. And so when I did get to Logan, I knew I wanted to work with athletes and I just connected the dots that if you're going to work with athletes, you have to be good clinically. And I think that ultimately was my motivator. I didn't know where it was going to take me, but I knew I needed to be pretty proficient clinic.
Beau Beard (06:34.574)
I'm just curious why Logan, if you're from Florida, went to Florida State, how'd you end up there?
Kevin Christie (06:37.207)
Yep. Yeah. Funny story actually. So again, back, I graduated Florida state in 2002 and let's call it 2001. was planning on going to life in Atlanta because there was no chiropractic schools in Florida at the time. So proximity wise being from South Florida originally Atlanta was the closest. And so I was just going to go there, but I was
Luckily enough, was shadowing a sports chiropractor in Tallahassee. just by chance, my roommate was dating a girl whose father was a chiropractor. And around the same time, both of them had said, you know, something weird is going on at life, university. And the guy that I was shadowing, he's like, you know, I did some continuing ed course at Logan. You should check it out. It's a beautiful campus, something weird is going on at life. So I took his word for it, flew out to Logan.
Beau Beard (07:31.694)
Was it, was it a man's asshole? Fuck me. Okay. Okay.
Kevin Christie (07:34.005)
What's that? It wasn't him. It was Fred. It was Fred Russo. but yeah, he, Fred Russo had gone to national in Chicago and he was like, he was so impressed by Logan when he did the post-grad thing there. He recommended I go check it out. Once I got there, I is beautiful. I'm going to, if two chiropractor are telling me something weird is going on at life, I'm going to go to Logan and sure enough,
I think I was at Logan for two weeks when life lost their accreditation and a lot of kids had to go to different schools and some of them ended up in my class and such. So yeah, it worked out very well for me, luckily.
Beau Beard (08:12.814)
Yeah. Well, kind of back to the, you know, the trajectory of your career here. So, you know, first few years, good associate job, kind of get an opportunity, you know, so maybe not get your arm twisted, but took the opportunity to jump at that. So obviously you said you were working the combine out until 2020. So you've still stuck in the game. It's not like you made a complete pivot into, you know, the coaching consulting around, but what, where in your career did you start to either? I don't want to say sometimes it sounds bad, like
Kevin Christie (08:33.643)
Mm-hmm.
Beau Beard (08:41.294)
When did you decide to focus more on business? Not in a bad way, but like, I want to build a scalable practice that I can remove myself from eventually, or go do other things. When did that become more of your focus?
Kevin Christie (08:52.469)
Yeah, definitely. you know, if I go back in time, I would, I would start learning. would have started learning early earlier. but for me, it was 2010. I ended up deciding to open up my own practice. That training facility that we were in actually was closing down and, the trainer that was bringing all the athletes was moving down to Miami. we had a, a makeshift opportunity, but I, I just essentially was opening up my own practice and I did that in 2010.
And it went well. Looking back, it was very, very fortunate how quick it grew. But sometimes when you grow quick, you don't know what you don't know. And then I just ran into a guy that was a pretty astute businessman. And he's like, you know, should check out Strategic Coach, which is an entrepreneur coaching group. And that would have been in 2013. 2013 was a crazy year because I actually purchased my
So when I opened up my practice in 2010, I was renting a couple of rooms out of an orthopedic office and we grew pretty quick and I was, it was low overhead. So I was able to save. And then there was a, a 3000 square foot medical suite in the same building that went for sale and I was able to buy it in 2013. So I took that on and at the same time I invested in, this coaching through strategic coach, because I knew I needed to refine the business systems and marketing and things like that.
And so, yeah, I mean, 2013, would say was the beginning of really, I don't want to call formally learning, but definitely investing in learning about, business, what it is, what it isn't, marketing. And then, from there, it was all just applying a lot of it to my, my practice. wouldn't say I stopped investing in myself from a clinical standpoint, but definitely was,
We had an associate at that time, so I was freed up a little bit. I was able to definitely apply both things.
Beau Beard (10:49.87)
So if you look back around that time that maybe not right when you started working with strategic coach, but maybe as you started to implement things, was there anything at that time that was kind of like, like, my God, I can't believe I haven't been doing this or kind of groundbreaking for it sounded like you're already obviously doing pretty well, but things that kind of catapulted you, does anything stick out?
Kevin Christie (11:08.567)
Yeah. Yeah. I felt like I was lacking in leadership, honestly. And, and I knew that that had to be something that needed to be fixed to, to get to where I wanted to. because around that time I opened up an office down in Miami and had a full-time associate down there. we actually had six locations inside of corporations. was doing corporate wellness, not through, ART or anything, but just a chiropractic inside of corporations. And I knew that what got me there.
wasn't going to get me where I wanted to go. And, you know, and I just think naturally, you know, Dan Sullivan of strategic coach, he'll always ask doctors that are in his program. It's, it's all kinds of different industries, very few doctors actually, but he'll always ask like, you know, are you a doctor or are you an entrepreneur that happens to be a doctor? And, and I would say I'm in that ladder, part of it, but
I think you can be both things and still be a great doctor. think that's like you mentioned earlier, kind of a big misconception.
Beau Beard (12:10.838)
Yeah. What, I'm just curious, and maybe you don't know his answer because it's come from him. What would Dan Sullivan's advice be to somebody that falls into the bucket or thinks that you fall into the bucket of I'm a doctor, not a, you know, entrepreneur who happens to be a doctor.
Kevin Christie (12:13.431)
you
Kevin Christie (12:26.167)
Yeah, I mean, there's no wrong answer. I think you have to know what you want. And I think, I do think the mistake chiropractors make is that it's a, it is kind of by nature and entrepreneurial endeavor, right? If you're a brain surgeon or a heart, you know, a cardiac surgeon, like you can just be a doctor, frankly, like you just show up, you're going to make well into the six figures, a lot of schooling. It's not easy, but you don't have to do any.
marketing, business ownership, if you don't want, like you could just literally be a surgeon, right? I think to be a chiropractor, you have to have some level of entrepreneurship to make it go. And if you just don't have it at all, maybe you're an intrapreneur, which I think is really a valuable asset to an associate where you would maybe do really well in a group setting and you can build a practice well.
within the parameters of another business. So that's something that you could maybe be aware of and find that. Or maybe you're you you're purely a clinician and you have no drive to do all the other things it takes, as you know, to run a business around that. And so maybe you need to find a good associate job. Obviously, I think the tricky part about our profession is that may not pay you well into the six figures.
If you just are purely clinician. Now, if you're intrapreneur, I think you can do, you can, you can maintain a healthy income. but yeah, I think it's tricky. And I think that's one of the hard parts about what we do. And I think one of the things that I try to work when I work with chiropractors is to get clear on what they are, but know that we, no matter where they are, they, they can improve, right? Like it's that fixed versus growth growth mindset. And the first stage of that is self-awareness.
Beau Beard (14:16.622)
Yeah. What I'm curious, I mentioned before, it's kind of becomes almost like a dirty connotation to say, Oh, you have more of a business focus or something. Why do you, I mean, I can assume from like past insurance issues and the public perception, but what do you, I mean, there's obviously an internal perception issue. Like we have an internal PR problem. What do you, where do think that comes from with our profession?
Kevin Christie (14:38.263)
Yep. Well, I think what makes our profession challenging, even if it's just aside from the PR thing, is that we're not in a high margin business, right? If you do plastic surgery, you could do a few of those in a day and each one of them is $12,000 and like it's high margin, right? Or there's a lot of things that are high margins. We're in a lower margin profession and just by nature. And so that that makes it a little bit tricky.
If someone has something that a chiropractor would fix, right? Let's just call it, they've got low back pain. Like there's a lot of people that handle low back pain, right? I think chiropractors tend to think they're competing against the other chiropractors in their area, but they're, competing against other types of chiropractors. They're competing with physical therapists, frankly, massage therapist, primary care doctors. A lot of people go to first all the orthopedists. mean, there's a lot of people that would
that treat what we do. And so there's a lot of options in the marketplace for people and the individual chiropractor isn't doing enough to position themselves as the expert. And yes, from a, from a profession wide standpoint, maybe chiropractic hasn't done a great enough job either. you know, that's just part of the reality for sure.
Beau Beard (16:04.387)
Okay. So you said 2013 is when he started working with strategic coaching. So do you still work with them personally?
Kevin Christie (16:08.822)
Yeah.
Yeah, I just got back actually five days ago. So I'm 12 years into it now and it's kind of, uh, it's been kind of my operating system for, for entrepreneurship and helps me push the envelope and stay sane.
Beau Beard (16:22.392)
Mm-hmm.
Beau Beard (16:29.734)
When obviously you're still in practice, I'm assuming practice now looks different in terms of like how many days a week you're seeing patients, how many hours you're working in that aspect. So when did you start to conceptualize MCM and what you're doing for and with chiropractors now and when did that start?
Kevin Christie (16:50.039)
Yeah, definitely. Um, 2014 got a letter, uh, from strategic coach about this guy, Joe Polish. I was hosting something called the genius network. was like, Oh, what is that? I didn't join it. Uh, but I looked into who this gentleman was. He had a podcast called I love marketing and it was with Dean Jackson. So I started listening to that. And then I started like really learning about the marketing side of things and, and, and really just, um, applying it to my practice.
Concurrently in 2015 in the state of Florida, the insurance reimbursement for chiropractic got hammered pretty hard, like real bad. And so I decided to slowly go out of network and I was applying a lot of the marketing I learned to try to navigate that. And it was, it was working. It wasn't perfect, but it was definitely, I saw the benefits of it. And so in July of 2016 started a free Facebook group, which now has about 5,000 members in it. And I just was.
Beau Beard (17:45.603)
Mm-hmm.
Kevin Christie (17:49.207)
It was just marketing for chiropractors and it was free and I was putting stuff in there and that's just all I did for quite some time. And then you fast forward, it April of 2017. I decided to start a podcast of the same name, Modern Chiropractic Marketing. The podcast is now called Modern Chiropractic Mastery because we do talk a lot more than just marketing. So I started the podcast and so for like two years I didn't monetize it.
creating content and getting it out there and being a resource for chiropractors. And then it would have been in July of 2018, Bobby, maybe, and I, Bobby of Ford Thinking Chiropractic Alliance, we co-created the Chiropractic Success Academy, which was an online academy. And it's $99 a month, very easy to digest, very helpful, still going strong to this day.
And yeah, I did that for a bit. And then it wasn't until 2019 where I started the coaching.
Beau Beard (18:52.238)
Mm-hmm. So I'm curious and you can tell me as little or as much as you want here. So if we took a snapshot of Kevin Christie's like a working day, working week and a working month, how much is dedicated of your time? You know, and I know every day looks different to building your practice, actually seeing patients and then, you know, working for and with MCM.
Kevin Christie (19:16.331)
Yeah. yeah. So building the practice, I kind of focus on some of the strategy and ideas and determine how much money we'll spend on maybe Google and Facebook ads. I'll still meet with MDs and attorneys. and then I don't do a whole lot other than just, I'm so integrated into my community. so that helps. There's no doubt about that, but from an actual going out there and do it. And then occasionally I'll do certain things like I'm hosting a, a two.
in two weeks, I'm hosting a workshop on injury prevention for endurance athletes. And I'm handling the injury prevention side. And then we have another expert. She's a PhD that handles the mental side of endurance athletes and coaches people on the mental side. I know you, I think you run a lot, right? So she helps with that side. So we're co-hosting an injury prevention workshop. So I'm going to do that.
I may not do a whole lot more out after that on that realm and gauge my associate probably do more of those things, but wanted to get the first one off the ground. so that's kind of the business building side of it. I'm down to two days a week or treating patients on Mondays and Thursdays, nine to five, nine to six. So full days on that. And, and then, yeah, the rest, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday would be working.
mostly MCM stuff and you today's a good day. Today's a Tuesday and today's all MCM. got to get the kids to school. went to the gym, got in, had a coaching call with a client, short one, just go over a few things. Then I recorded my own podcast with a gentleman. Then I hop on another call with a client to work through a couple of things. Then I do a group coaching call for our members, did that. And then now I'm recording this. So it's a lot of talking.
Uh, on a day like today, I would say Tuesday is kind my, creative day.
Beau Beard (21:14.286)
Yeah. Again, you can tell me as little or as much as you want. Does that reflection of time, is that parallel income streams? Like was there a, that jump off point where you started, you know, you did, like you said, you didn't monetize things for two years. think some people wait to pull a parachute until like income is flowing, right? Like, well, I can't do this because I can't legitimize walking away from days of practice.
Kevin Christie (21:17.899)
Mm-hmm.
Beau Beard (21:41.186)
Well, I'm assuming being a businessman, it's not like you were just like, I'm going to, you know, peace out. I'm going do two days of seeing patients and lose money. But what's it look like? We don't have to have civics, but like, does it mere time allocated now to where income sources are coming from? Cause I think a lot of people in our profession, other professions that want to deliver content, monetize a podcast, think sometimes don't know what other people.
are actually making and then they don't know like, should I jump? Should I try to monetize it? Like, should I just be banging out in the clinic and tell, you know, I've got X amount in the bank? And I think it's confusing for a lot of people.
Kevin Christie (22:15.263)
It is, and I don't mind sharing if you got the time on it, because I think it is important, because I think there are a lot of misconceptions out there, right? As far as how hard it is to build something, to A, just build a practice, right? Like just, that's hard. So I would say, you gotta understand that. Like it's hard. And then I think there's other factors, right? So for me,
I own my office real estate and it's not cheap every month to operate it. And so the, the practice needs to function to pay the mortgage and the condo dues and all those things. So I've got a little bit of a, a behemoth there that needs to operate to, handle that. Right. And then MCM on the other end, which is actually now bigger than our practice is, is, is in a really good place there. And in what I've done.
over time is as I remove myself some from patient care, I have been able to pay myself less from the other business, okay. From the chiropractic business as my profit, my revenue and profits on MCM have increased. I can then pay myself there. Yes. The trajectory of my income. I mean, granted in the last six years, I've had two kids too. And so, you know, that it's not cheap. So my cost of living has gone up. So I,
I need to make a certain amount to do that. And then what I kind of do, at least for me in my vision, and I don't mind stating my vision is that within a couple of years, like I'm really probably not owning the practice and I'm focusing on MCM and going all in on that. Whereas someone else, and I know some other people that have had similar career paths as me on like helping chiropractors out from a business standpoint.
their practice never really was a whole lot, frankly. They didn't own the office real estate. They didn't have this anchor. And so they just kind of shut that down. It was easy to just kind of move on from that and go all the way into marketing for chiropractors or whatever for chiropractors and burn the ships. My ship's a little bit bigger to burn and so it's taken longer.
Kevin Christie (24:33.121)
to do that. And I just say that so that people don't get this misconception that they're going to start a side hustle. within a year or two, it's going to replace their income or their practice. And they're going to, you know, right off into the sunset on there. You gotta pull those levers and look at what it, what it's looking like. And then it just, it's matching up with what your risk tolerance is as well. Everybody's got a different risk tolerance and you gotta be honest with yourself on that as well.
Beau Beard (24:54.702)
You
Beau Beard (25:00.354)
Yeah. And, again, I'd love to get your insight on this, you know, like I got into podcasting and I've kind of went in and out on different themes for the past decade or more. And one thing that's kind of always come back is like, why am I doing in the first place? You know, rather than am I just going to make money off of it? And I kind of had to come to the realization. I don't really, Hey, I don't, I don't have the motivation to like make it a huge podcast and be like, this is going to be my job. But then I realized like, it's, marketing. Like I would.
Kevin Christie (25:13.729)
Yeah.
Beau Beard (25:27.532)
Like we basically are recording our group meetings. That's like the week interview. I like talking to people in our field because I learned from them. It's like, well, okay. Now does that make me a ton of money? No, but it can, you can spin it around as marketing for your practice. And I think as long as you, for me, I have some sort of like use for it besides just like creating content, like, okay, it actually is creating traction someplace. I'm curious, what would be.
I mean, this is part of, you know, I don't want you to give a voice free advice, but for like a new student, a new doc that's all in on the clinical, right? So they're back in your shoes, you know, years one to three. What would be one or two of your main tips that you're like, you got to start doing this or looking at this from the business or marketing side to set yourself up for success.
Kevin Christie (26:15.607)
Well, I think it's so important to be good clinically. And you got to also understand that what good clinically means in year eight is going to be better than it is in year two and three. So you got to, you have to be able to get really good clinically because if you're a decent human being, which I know most of them are, is that you only feel good about selling something that you believe in, right? You wouldn't sell a product that you didn't believe in.
Well, your treatment skill set is a product service, but if you don't believe in it or even subconsciously, you're just like, man, I, I'm not good. Then you're going to have a hard time looking at person in the eye and giving them a treatment plan based on that. And, and so you, you have to be good. And then the whole idea of what, what does it mean to be good at business as a chiropractor? Right. It's not that you're.
you know, this like wizard at business in my mind, the way I always think about what is good, what is good business as a chiropractor is providing the best patient experience. And, and if that's like my vision of like, I'm going to provide the best patient experience, there's a lot of, spokes off that way. Yeah. Like obviously the clinical has gotta be really good or it's a bad patient experience. You better work on your communication skills and your bedside manner, cause that's part of the experience.
You got to start being able to have profit and revenue so you can hire a good team because a good team is so much better than just a one man band for the long-term for the patient experience. You know, have it be able to get good with revenue and profit and be able to reinvest in the business so that you can afford, you name the technology, you know, the treatment technology, whatever, see, or the gym equipment, you know, all the things that are nice. Like the better you get at understanding
that good business is the patient experience, then you're gonna feel good about it and say, yeah, I'm providing the best experience. then part of that is also like, if you're struggling with understanding profit and cashflow and how to get good profit and cashflow, you're gonna walk into that treatment room, know, kind of distracted about affording payroll or your kids braces, right? So.
Kevin Christie (28:36.605)
you gotta be able to go into that room and not be like really struggling. know, there's gonna be days, we all have days and weeks and but when it's that chronic financial struggle, that's gonna chip away at the patient experience, right? And if the patient experience is not really good, guess what else then gets impacted? Patient outcomes, right? And so you could, I could give you a doctor, Bo, that's like really good clinically. And if I put them in a,
Beau Beard (28:57.901)
Mm-hmm.
Kevin Christie (29:05.153)
group practice that was humming and firing all cylinders and everything's perfect, they would get amazing results. If I took that same doctor and gave them this freaking struggle of a life around it because they haven't squared away what it means to be, to have a thriving practice, that's going to chip away at the outcomes that the patients are going to get, even if the clinical is pretty good, right? Or is good. So it's just, I think you got to understand that good business
is the patient experience and then you got to dissect out those spokes.
Beau Beard (29:39.404)
Yeah, I think, which also, I mean, in other words, it's like shifting the focus from you being the best, but you being competent for that experience. I think that's, I'm just being honest from my standpoint, like when I first got out of school, and maybe this is a lot of people's case, like I was like, I need to be the best because I felt like I wasn't good enough. Right. But then you realize like, it is like what I provide them. And as soon as you make that flip.
That's when you're like, I didn't do great on that case. Maybe that's cause I didn't know how to handle that case. didn't have the skill I needed to. And then it's kind of organic rather than I'm just going to take every seminar and read every book possible to be the best. like, well, that's somewhat unrealistic. And you're also going to drive yourself nuts. Just like, you know, the cashflow scenario. so I love that kind of thought of basically reinvesting in a spit, like basically getting clear, like, it's patient experience. Okay. How would you do that? Rather than like,
I got a social media and be the biggest person in town, work every event and be the best clinician. It's like, no, just focus on that. And if you can do that, things will grow, which will allow you to do other things. So MCM's rolling. You stated a vision of, I may not be in this practice that I'm currently in. been in for the past two decades and a couple more years. What else is on the horizon? mean, is MCM, does it?
I mean, it's changed already. I don't mean for marketing to mastery. What's the horizon for maybe the next five to 10 years of this thing? How big are you looking? Where else are you going? Are you going outside of chiropractic?
Kevin Christie (31:08.575)
No, probably not going outside of chiropractic. know, people bring that up quite a bit and, who knows, but I, I'm all kind of focused on the, on the chiropractic profession. And if I get to a certain situation where I'm all in on MCM, it definitely is, you know, optimizing our, coaching slash marketing programs for chiropractors. we have quite a few clinics underneath that already. And so that's kind of our, our,
meat and potatoes there, right? And then the mastermind, the East group is maxed out at 25, which has been awesome. The West group is growing and getting close to that. So I picture having two full East and West mastermind groups that's in person. Just been way better than I expected when we launched that in 2022. The other thing is
Kevin Christie (32:02.81)
MCM, FTCA and MPI, we're, we're going to collaborate and do a big event in 2027. The last weekend in January, we're already kind of staking our claim on there. We're trying to do a big business event with the three entities combined and, and, um, really looking to make that a no frills conference on business for chiropractors, not a lot of fluff. want people to go there, definitely have connections and accountability and all that, but like
do some heads down work with other like-minded chiropractors. So that would say that's kind of the big thing and then just grow it from there and then from a personal life, it'll give me a little bit more freedom of time and schedule. And my family and I, we've already kind of burned the ships on it next summer, summer of 2026, we're gonna be doing six week immersion trips.
in different parts of the world each summer. We'll be in kind of countryside of England next summer and actually having a one day masterclass with Chris Chippendale there. And then each summer will be a different location, maybe in Europe or stateside wherever, but really immerse into that. We've got a five and three year old boys. There'll be six and four next summer. And we want to make that part of our, our family's vision to do that. So my, my career vision,
has to line up with my family vision. I think that's something that a lot of people get off is they're off on one of the two or both. Like maybe they don't sit down with their spouse and create a family vision and then a business vision that will ultimately support that. And so that's the way I look at my next five to 10 years.
Beau Beard (33:52.526)
I think that's awesome. sounds, mean, I, a respect that having two little ones myself, because it can be tough to create some space, sit down and plan rather than just like go. Um, I'm going to be honest, I get guilty of sometimes it's like, I can do all this stuff. I'll just, I'll just keep rolling. And you're like, Oh, this is, yeah. You get into a spot where like, Hmm, you don't want to keep it going this way. Um, so it sounds like, you know, like you said, you, the East.
Kevin Christie (34:09.397)
Yeah.
Beau Beard (34:19.342)
cohort is full, the West group of MCM is almost there. Is there anything, I know you obviously have the Facebook group and there's some stuff going through FTCA. Is there anything aimed specifically besides the online group possibly? Is there anything specifically aimed at students to get them kind of thinking about this early, but then also springboards them into when they were practicing doctor back into the business side for you?
Kevin Christie (34:44.479)
Yeah, absolutely. the Cardboard Success Academy, definitely we have a student discount rate on there. It's really easy to digest and learn. I do some one-off things for different schools and associations with students, then I am, we, we're turning our, my office in Boca Raton, Florida. We have a pretty big size open rehab area, which we're going be able to kind of convert into a teaching area pretty easily. And we're in the process of doing that.
Beau Beard (35:00.878)
.
Kevin Christie (35:11.587)
We got one of those big smart TV boards and all that type of stuff. I've got foldable chairs and tables, the whole nine yards. so in November, I think it's November 22nd, I'm going to start doing probably a couple of times a year, a free business, four hours on a Saturday for students. So we're starting to early promote that a bit. But yeah, that'll be free and they just can come and we'll tackle some of the things. My goal for the students.
is to understand when they get out, whether they decide to work for someone or open up their own practice or go into a partnership, you got to go out and you got to start laying the foundation soon, right? I think one of the big misconceptions that associates have, especially when they come out of school is that they don't want to build the owner's practice, right? Like I don't want to go and waste two, three years of getting out in a community if I'm just going to open up my own practice in three years.
Even if that's your vision, that's fine. but you don't want, when you open up your own practice for the first time, you don't want that to be the first time you've ever cracked open a book on business or had any learning of marketing and community outreach and all that. You'd rather get some, some practice. And I think that was one of the things that helped me when I look back now that it's been 20 years was when I was an associate, I was doing a ton to try to build my practice.
so that when I went into that partnership, I had some experience and I did it a second time. Then when I opened my own practice, I did it again for the third time and it was so much easier to do it that third time. And it really was helpful for me to do that. And I think the other thing I'll say for the students is I know it's a tricky time. Things are expensive, student loans are high, but I navigated the OA crisis, right? So I had opened up the...
Beau Beard (36:45.645)
Mm-hmm.
Kevin Christie (37:04.119)
that partnership practice in that sports training facility, I don't know, handful of months before the economy just absolutely tanked. so, yeah, things weren't expensive, but no one had any money to do anything. And we pushed through it. so that fast forward to 2010, April, 2010, when I opened my own practice, we were on the other side of that, essentially. And so all I knew was to work hard and get out there a lot.
And when I did that and the economy started to improve a little bit, things went well. So we don't know what's on the other side of this inflation and whatever. and so don't let that beat you down. We've all been through it. If you talk to anybody that's been practicing for even like you, know, you went through COVID like it's like, it's, there's going to be times if you're going to practice for 40 years, there's going to be about four things you're to go through that were really hard. So, enjoy the ride. You know, it's not easy.
Beau Beard (37:57.742)
That's, always say, you know, I, I watched what I say, but then I'm kind of like, eh, that's not true. Like I would say, oh, we were lucky. We made it through COVID like we did, but it was honestly, we were prepared. You just don't know what you're preparing for. He, pointed me in a good spot, you know, so if something happens, obviously nobody had foresight for that. But yeah, I kind of always snicker like, it wasn't luck. It was like, you you, kind of got there. Cause I know people that didn't make it, you know, or had to massively, you know, pivot or go work for somebody or something, which is fine. Um.
Kevin Christie (38:09.077)
Yes.
Beau Beard (38:28.046)
is, you know, I'm 13 years in practice, so I'm behind you by a good bit. But as I've went through practice, I've kind of, you have little like evolutions, you don't, I don't realize until you kind of look back, right? Like, oh, yeah, I want to be the most clinically competent. And then it's like, well, yeah, I want to be really good and provide that experience. And then, you know, I'm at a phase now, due to mainly some negative, you know, experiences, we lost a doctor.
lost, it's not like died. He left unexpectedly, right? Which we were kind of like, and that hurt a big earner walked away right as we had made basically bought our building, put the down payment on it. We're looking to expand into a second office and it kind of like, changed everything. So it made me have to kind of go back in essence and be like, I've got to double down on some stuff, like get out in the community, more build up my other two doctors, help them build up their practice. Poor people, you know, we just talked about students or,
people that may be getting started on this road. What about those docs that are out there that aren't doing bad, but they're not doing what they want? Is there, you know, they're not crushing it. They think there should be making more. Maybe they're struggling. Maybe they honestly are like, Hey, I'm behind on student loans and the mortgage I got myself into or whatever it is. Is there any different advice for them from the business standpoint? Because maybe they are clinically competent, right? So that part's kind of been taken care of. Anything you, know, that you generally are throwing out there.
safe people look into in that scenario.
Kevin Christie (39:55.561)
Yeah, I think you definitely got to get a outside set of eyes on it. That's what I did. I've shared my struggle with 2015 was really tough personally with the divorce and luckily there wasn't any kids or anything. And then with the practice with the insurance I mentioned earlier that got really bad. we had, yeah, like the insurance we were in that were the insurance on the corporate locations. was, I had,
three associates, was four of us doctors, the payroll was getting high, things were good. And then when the insurance reimbursement went south, it was really, really challenging. And I definitely ran into building up some debt that I hadn't ever had any experience with doing before. But it was like, know, luckily I had some line of credit. mean, it wasn't like we were close to falling down. just, had to get the ship steered correctly. And I remember
I got some outside help on all that and it really laid the foundation to put me in a good place. cause then, you know, I would say 2015 was hard, 2016 was hard. was like early-ish 2017 where the practice started to do well again and put myself in a pretty good space to then launch some of the things I wanted to do with MCM. Cause I wasn't in like reactive mode anymore.
And then ultimately by time COVID came in 2020, we were in a good place and able to navigate that. So if you talk to anybody that's been practicing for long enough, you're not the only person that's been in a bad spot or struggled or spinning your wheels for a little bit. Everybody's had their moments. And it was cool, like in our East mastermind last year, we had two members.
At the time one was 62, the other one was 71. And I would say the majority of our members are 38 to 54. I would say that's like the sweet spot. We've got some younger for sure. And had a few older, but we did a wisdom session with our two older docs who are just very successful, right? Great. Everything's really good at this point, but
Kevin Christie (42:14.071)
Uh, we, we had them share, like, what's it like to have this longevity in this profession? What are some of the things to look out for? What are some of the struggles? And one of those docs, his building burned out, his practice burned down physically to the ground in like, I don't know, 2009 or seven or something like that. Right. And he's totally fine now. Like couldn't be better financially as a car. But he's doing amazing. The other doc, he lost all his money in the, in the dot com bubble in like 2000.
right? And like, all of it invested all of it in it all gone. He's totally fine now, right? So it was just good to hear docs that have been through the, the, the years, and share with like, yeah, we all have those moments. We all look back on particular years or particular stages and say, this was hard. You know, if you mentioned, you know, you have young kids too. if you're in a stage of career, we got a bunch of young kids, that's a little bit harder than when they're
out of the house in 15, 20 years. And it's just you and your wife, right? It's like, there's different stages and you got to understand that and just kind of roll with it and have the resilience to overcome it.
Beau Beard (43:25.07)
Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, that's, I've always had the advice because I was lucky enough to have a friend that has been a couple of years ahead of me and always been successful kind of from the get go, both as an associate and then doing his own thing. And that same thing, I mean, from day one, he hired a consultant and then he's always had pretty good, pretty good, I would say humility to kind of just go out and talk to people and just be like, Hey, this what I'm dealing with. Like, I think that's one of the best things I take away from him is.
He's just not afraid to ask for help and he's just very transparent. There's no like trying to him haul around it and make himself look better. It's just like this one dealing with this. Um, and he'll ask anybody. So I, you know, and that, think that goes on the clinical side too. Like I have people I call when can't figure a case out or, mean, I just smacked myself in the forehead the other day about how a case went and you're like, God. Um, so it happens both ways. Even I think you get 30 years into practice business or clinical. Um, well, Hey,
It's been awesome talking to you. One last question here, and this is kind of just a general one I ask everybody, or kind of two-parter. So you have two decades of clinical prowess and obviously this business side too, so you can steal or play on either side here. What is one thing that you used to think was just absolutely true that you've completely changed your mind on? And that doesn't have to be super recent, but you're like, this is what I was sold on and I have completely about faced, whether that's clinic.
wife, business, anything stand out.
Kevin Christie (44:55.319)
Um, yeah, I think it's that, you know, in a book that I always reference probably too much is, from strength to strength. Um, really good book about the certain qualities you have in your earlier, your first half of your life, like up to age 40 versus the second half of your life. He talks a lot about fluid intelligence when you're earlier and then crystallized intelligence or like wisdom later on and how there's certain things you like I 45 now I can't imagine doing again.
But I guess what it would be is like, kind of thought when, when I became a chiropractor and I came out and I was maybe going to state conferences or things and just hearing everybody's complaints about the profession and the, the kind of the glass ceiling on there. I would say I bought into it a little bit early on. And then when I made that shift to realize that
really the only limitation you have is yourself in a lot of ways. Yeah, it's hard, it's not easy. Insurance, if it paid twice as much as it does, it'd be great. But for every profession that has struggles, which they all do, I can give you people that are excelling in there. And I think that's the biggest thing that people have to understand is that, especially if you're in that first half of your career, what it looks like now can look completely different later as long as you maintain
that vision of growth that you're going and you just can't see what skill sets you're going to have later on down the
Beau Beard (46:26.798)
Yeah, that's, that's awesome. Okay. Let's spin that question around to tie it up here. So what, again, pull from wherever you want. What's something that you're like, I just, I believe this is the way it is. I think this is true, but there's no peer reviewed evidence on it. There hasn't been a business book written about it or this out or the other.
Kevin Christie (46:47.925)
I don't think AI is going to impact chiropractors. I think it's going to be all positive for chiropractors. I don't think it's going to be all positive for everybody else per se, but I think for the chiropractic profession, there's going be a lot of positives. I think it's going be a lot easier to get your notes done down the road. It's going to be a lot easier to figure out information. You're going to have a co-pilot with you, but I don't see it impacting
Beau Beard (46:50.574)
I want to hear about this for sure. So let's get into it.
Kevin Christie (47:18.111)
your ability to render services as we do. think other healthcare professions will have some issues, but I don't think chiropractors will.
Beau Beard (47:27.746)
Yeah. What, okay. So you obviously talk to people that are voicing fears or we're hearing something in the public in general. get that. What are some of the things that you think people are afraid of in terms or fearful of with AI in our profession? Cause I don't see some sort of robot manually manipulating people. what are the fears?
Kevin Christie (47:46.455)
Yeah, I think if honestly, if you, you maintain really good hands, then I don't think you're replaceable. Now, I think where some car writers get concerned is basically the information side of it, where people are going to be able to just figure out what they've got going on themselves, which is potentially the case. Right. Um, and some people have expressed like, they're going to be able to figure out exactly what they have from AI, even down to directional preferences. If you're a McKenzie guy, um,
And then they're going to be, they're going to be given exactly what to do from a at home corrective standpoint. And that's going to solve their problem. And now I think if you're a chiropractor that does not possess any hands on skill and you're only reliant on modalities or other things, maybe, maybe, uh, don't, I still don't think so, but those are, I would say to answer your question, some of the chiropractors are, are thinking that way. But I think the ones that are really good with their hands, whether it's
how patient adjustment, soft tissue, assessments that involve like you being there, really doing that, think that's not gonna change.
Beau Beard (48:55.918)
Yeah. Well, I think it'll help a lot of us diagnostically. mean, like John, implementing it and, um, in the directional preference thing, what I mean, we talked about on the clinical time. People are already usually doing their directional preferences. Like, Oh, you need some overpressure or you need to do it more. It's like, you'll still have a job. there'll be, um, yeah, that's really, really good advice. And I'm sure, I'm sure, know, if people in our profession outside the profession, they're building all sorts of tools and technology based upon AI that are going.
Kevin Christie (48:58.379)
Yeah, absolutely.
Kevin Christie (49:13.195)
Yeah, yes.
Beau Beard (49:24.822)
to help us and like said, it's all how you use it. mean, at the end of the day, there's technology out there that's being used to help practices and there's technology that people spend money on. It's not doing a darn thing for them. So again, it's going to be how you wield it. So I think you also, and people that are involved in the business side of things as they run parallel to these technological advances will still play a role in like, how do we implement these things and use the tools that are being developed?
Kevin Christie (49:52.439)
Exactly.
Beau Beard (49:53.422)
Yeah. All right, man. Well, hey, uh, it was great talking to you. Like I said, I really hope we get to meet in person at some point in the near future. Um, and I hope that anybody listening today, uh, you know, a learned something in this, but also realize like Kevin is an invaluable resource of profession at large. Um, if you want to just kind of give us a quick rundown of where people can find you and more information on MCM.
Kevin Christie (50:00.617)
Absolutely.
Kevin Christie (50:16.191)
Yeah. Our website, modernchiropracticmarketing.com. You'll find everything there. All our programs, our podcast, we have a weekly podcast every Thursday. have, we don't miss everything. Practice growth. we get about 55,000 downloads a month on that. And it's been a fun process to grow. And we're always looking to continue to bring really good guests as much as we can. so yeah, check it out there.
Beau Beard (50:42.648)
Very cool. Well, thank you again, Kevin. I appreciate your time,
Kevin Christie (50:45.783)
Thank you.
