Ep 43: Find Or Create Your Dream Job with Dr. Lara Hochman

How valuable would it be for us to wake up each day feeling excited to go to work?

What if we feel confident in working out any conflict that may arise with our colleagues in the workplace?

With a burnout rate of 40%, physicians often don’t feel these goals are possible to achieve. Yet there are physicians who are finding immense professional fulfillment at work.  What did they do differently?  How do we proceed to find our dream job in today’s challenging healthcare environment?

💪 Before a job search, start with examining what’s important to us, be honest and go deep.

💪 Once we know what we want, find positions that have at least 80% of what we are looking for, with the other 20% not being deal-breakers.

💪 Know that the number one most important feature of any practice is the people. Utilize every opportunity to get to know them. 

💪 Stay in curiosity mode during the search process. 

💪 Don’t be afraid to have tough conversations. 

Statistics do not have to get in the way of our dreams.  Physicians can find or create opportunities for work that bring growth and satisfaction.  Professional fulfillment does not exist in a bubble. Workplace culture is an important element to consider when we are seeking to live our dream life.

I loved this empowering conversation with Dr. Lara Hochman, a Family Physician, who is also the Founder and CEO of Happy Day Health, a matchmaking service to connect amazing doctors with high-quality physician-own practices.

Go to this week’s Dare to Dream Physician Podcast episode to hear the second part!

Dare to Dream Physician Resources:

Dare to Dream Physician, Life Planning for Physicians

 https://daretodreamphysician.com

Dare to Dream Physician on Facebook

 https://www.facebook.com/daretodreamphysician/

DreamPhysician on Instagram

https://www.instagram.com/dreamphysician/

Resources for Dr. Lara Hochman:
Happy Day Health
http://happydayhealth.co

Lara Hochman MD on LinkedIn
https://www.linkedin.com/in/larahochman/

Transcript

Dr. Gray, Host 0:00

Welcome back to another episode of the dare to dream physician podcast. I'm so excited today to share

0:07

Welcome back to another episode of the dare to dream physician podcast. I'm so excited to share part two of an amazing conversation that I had with Dr. Laura Hochman. If you have not heard last week's episode, episode 42, know what you're assigning? Add that to your queue and listen to it. After you finished listening to this episode, we continue our gem pack conversation to help physicians figure out how can they find or create their dream? As I introduced in the last episode, Dr. Laura Hawkman is a family physician. She's also the founder and CEO of happy day health.

Dr. Gray, Host 0:41

For any physicians who go to work and care about what your day is like at work. And just overall the experience of being a physician, practicing medicine, you are going to love our conversation today. It's going to be so valuable.. I also want to put in a disclaimer that everything we discuss in this podcast and all of my podcasts episodes represents the personal viewpoints and opinions of my guests and myself, and do not represent any views or opinions of the organizations or institutions that we are affiliated with. As always use your own judgment when it comes to your personal and professional decisions. There's so many things I want to talk to you about, but one of the things, you mentioned workplace culture and how it's important to find a culture. That's a good fit, so you're a physician and and now you're also helping physicians find the right workplace. Can you share with us, what do you think are some elements of a good workplace and what are some signs of that? Like how do we tell that this is, this has, this place has a good workplace culture for.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 1:52

Yeah. So the first thing to do before even looking at a practice is decided. Who you are or realizing who you are and then deciding what's important to you. So are you someone that needs more admin time to finish your charting or what's important to you? is it the hours? Is it the patient volume? Is it the payer mix? Some people really like, um, underserved is it that you prefer to work with, more concierge types of patients and the care that you provide is going to be good either way, but it's a different type of conversation and different types of services that you need to provide and different challenges either way. So first you need to decide what's important to you. Do you want to come to work, see patients go home, or do you want to come to work? See patients be part of how the practices run, maybe partnership, track, learning the business side of medicine. All of that stuff. Think about what you went before you then even go look at a practice. So it's setting up your expectations. So you don't get distracted by all the shiny objects that certain practices can provide, which may not necessarily be in line with your values. So once you know, who are you, what do you want? Then you go look for the practice that meets that. And of course, you need to have some flexibility around that because nothing will ever be 100% perfect, but you want to find something that's at least 80% what you're looking for and that other 20% is not a deal breaker. So when you go look for a practice, the number one most important thing by far bar, none is the people, or these are the people you want to spend every day with. Do you like these people? Do you, are you looking for mentorship? Is that something they want to provide? are the hours, what you need, do you need to get your kids to school every morning? You don't have someone else to do it, but work starts at six or 7:00 AM. That's not something you can do is research important to you. all of those things that are important, you need to decide before you go into the practice. And then during the interview process, asked those questions, don't be afraid to have the tough conversations. You may want to leave some of those tough conversations for a little bit later in the process. And that would be things like salary negotiation. and if you are working with a recruiter, have the recruiter have those conversations for you. Let's not ruin a great thing because of money. It happens. so while you're looking. You want to be doing all of those things and speak with other physicians in the practice, ask them what they love about in Austin. What they don't love about it, ask the front desk people what they like about it before they even know who you are. one of the tricks that I do when I, one of my physicians is actually one of my clients. And, when I was there the one day for an appointment, I was speaking to the front desk staff. I was like, so how long have you been here? And what do you like about it? Cause I hadn't decided if I wanted to work with those clients yet or not, because I prefer to only work with clients. I like and who I know, they are good to their employees. And so you really want to approach a job in the same way of where do you want to be? Would you be happy getting up, spending the day with these people? Can you have difficult conversations with them? because that is all huge and salary certainly comes into. In part, you want to know what salary is acceptable to you. And so some of the practices I work with, which are, often direct primary care or direct specialty care practices they con to offer a high salary to begin with, but there's a high potential for salary. And, and of course, a better work-life balance with direct care practices, but that's not for everyone. Not everyone can accept that pay cut because of loans and childcare and life's responsibilities. So knowing what you need and what you went beforehand is super important, because then you can really tailor what you find to what you're looking for.

Dr. Gray, Host 6:04

Yeah. I'm going to just pause the goodies that you're giving out for a minute and just, just comment on, th those are so important because sometimes, our inability to, find something that works is just because we don't know what we want. And that's why I love what you said. first figure out what you really want. What's cause you're right. it's, this is the exercise that we do so that we don't get FOMO fear of missing out, Because if all the shiny objects like, oh, this practice offers this much money, maybe twice the amount of money and oh, would this practice offers great work-life balance. And if you don't know, what's the most important to you, you're just like every time you look at an ad or an opportunity, you're just like, oh, that one, that I'm missing out on that one. If I don't take that one and it's, and you're not necessarily missing out because of the place that pays, twice the amount of guarantee salary is a place where you can work with these people and you don't want to see a patient every three minutes, you know that you're not missing out, cause that's not really a salary that's really sustainable for your life anyway. And so it's one of those things. knowing what you really want and then you can really prioritize, what is it that you're looking for. So I love that. Yeah,

Dr. Hochman, Guest 7:19

exactly. And if you're, if you pick the higher salary patient, every three minutes job, you know what? You can change your mind. You can leave. We have to something else

Dr. Gray, Host 7:31

but what you said, talk to the people. And see if you like it just kind of that Gish don't like can do feel like you get along with them. You think this is a person I can have a difficult conversation with I, had shared with you the article and physician? Well-being 2.0. and one of the things that I really liked in that article is there is, this evolution. Workplace culture from one of, stoicism and perfectionism, so now more of, vulnerability and, a growth mindset and having that culture that supports that. So for me if I'm interviewing somewhere and I'm talking to somebody that will be one of the things that I'm looking for, which is, when I talk to this person, do they sound like somebody who is more, open and, open to share both the failures and the successes and, and also think about in the future, not being stagnant, like this is the way, and it's always the way it's going to be, but being more open to how can we grow? how can we get better? this is the way it is now, what can it be like?

Dr. Hochman, Guest 8:37

Yeah, we're evolving as people and we're evolving as an industry. And that's so important. And one thing I didn't mention is like you say, speaking to those people is important, but read between the lines. So if the only opportunity you have to speak to people is in front of their other employee years. you really have to read between the lines. So if you want to, if you're able to speak to them in private, where they can be a little bit more open and honest, and they're not going to want to bad mouth their employer, but if they say something like, we wanted to make a change that we thought would help and not affect the bottom line, but it wasn't able to happen or something. They, dig a little deeper, see what they say.

Dr. Gray, Host 9:22

Exactly. Yeah. This is where the. Curiosity really comes in. just, not sensationalist journalism type of curiosity, but just, just like if someone said that to me, not even, in an interview, I would be curious to see. Yeah. W what do you mean by that? tell me a little bit more, and it's not necessarily to dig the dirt, but it's more just so I understand what, I understand that organization, when I walk out of there, I have a better understanding of how that organization works.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 9:50

Yeah. Yeah. You want to know how they approach conflict because there's always conflict. And do they really lean into that conflict and do they ask for feedback and do they take suggestions or do they, throw a yoga class at you or whatever it is.

Dr. Gray, Host 10:05

um,

Dr. Hochman, Guest 10:06

yoga is great, but it's not going to fix whatever caused the problem to begin with.

Dr. Gray, Host 10:12

yeah, yeah, absolutely. I, I just reminded me of one of the questions that used to ask this is actually back when I was interviewing for residencies is, I would ask, have any residents left and, and then if they say yes, just asking a little bit more and they usually will just offer oh yes, this resident left. And it was this reason, but, just understanding that better, same thing with, interviewing for, physician positions, just curious, why is this position open, you know, as it is open because the last 10 people left or, or, you grown so much that you had to create this position.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 10:43

Yeah, that's a great question to ask because it can really make the practice shine, they can say we've grown so much and our patients are so happy and we have this long wait list. that's a wonderful reason to be hiring or is it, this doctor just retired. She's 35 years old or, plus that's not so good.

Dr. Gray, Host 11:02

and the other thing is listening to what they say, because, okay, this person retired, or, there's a reason, but like you said, when they talk about it, that's going to show, how do they handle conflict, How do they handle something that, maybe is a little bit not straightforward and just the way that PR present the situation, what say a lot about, how that, what that workplace culture.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 11:26

Yeah, absolutely.

Dr. Gray, Host 11:28

Yeah. So I want to shift gears to talk more about happy day. and just tell us a little bit more about that. I know you started it explaining it, for somebody who has never heard of this business, tell us what it's about.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 11:43

Yeah. So I helped doctors find private practices, that are physician owned, typically small practices. So I worked pretty closely with the private practices to figure out exactly who they are, what they provide, what are their strengths, what are their weaknesses? And then I go out and I find the doctors, or sometimes the doctors come and find me. And, so a big part of what I do is that matchmaking process of matching the right doctor to the right practice. and of course the practice gets the say in who they pick, but, but really understanding what the practice is looking for in order to go out and find them that right. person. And sometimes I'll be speaking with a doctor who, I've contacted them for one job, but in speaking with them, I actually realized that there's another practice that is a much better fit for them. And so I actually ended up steering them towards the other practice when they would be a better cultural fit and is more what they're looking for. so that's what I do in a nutshell while I do that, I often do a lot of, I call it physician career consulting. So I speak with a lot of doctors who either they've contacted me or maybe I've contacted them. And, we talk about what it is in their current practice that they like, what they don't like. Are they happy? Are they unhappy? We talk about either changes that they can make. so I speak with a lot of doctors who are burned out unhappy, for whatever reason. and sometimes the answer is, just last week I was speaking with a doctor who actually loved her practice, but the commute and the medical directorship for killing her that time commitment for that was gigantic. And so she was out looking for other jobs already. but what we ended up talking about was how to make this place, that she loves a better workplace. And so is it dropping the medical directorship? Is it working from home doing tele medicine? Is it, decreasing her hours? There's a lot of things that she can do with in the framework of the practice that she already loves versus moving to a different practice and, in that discussion, we talked about what she's actually looking for, which is what we talked about earlier. I've done that for physicians that, I have a job for them. I've done it for physicians that I may not have a job for them today, but I may a year from now. And even if I don't have a job for them, I love helping guide physicians in what the best thing for them is. there was another doctor, a few weeks ago who I spoke with. she contacted me saying, I'm looking for a job. And we started talking about what she was looking for and it was glaringly obvious that she wanted to start her own practice. And so guess what? She started her own practice. a lot of what I do anyway is just speaking with physicians on what they want, what they can do better and, spreading the word. we don't have to settle for the status quo. We can negotiate, we can create our own things. we can make our lives what we want and need them to be, and we can be there for ourselves and we can be there for our family.

Dr. Gray, Host 14:46

Wow. So I'm going to address the elephant in the room as you're talking about this. I love the description that you gave and I love the term matchmaker, actually. That's such a beautiful term. because that is how I think about, you know, physician employment in general is that it really should be a matchmaking process. let's also, address the elephant in the room, which is what you are doing is, you know, there are people who already do this, right? And they're the recruiters that, I'm always getting spam messages in my emails and in my phones. And they're saying, there is a job, the job has nothing to do with me. In fact, it's an, a specialty that I don't even practice anymore, even though I'm bird certified in it, it doesn't stop them from calling me, even though I tell them, stop calling me. So, are you in the same category as these people?

Dr. Hochman, Guest 15:35

So, this is why I started a recruiting company, because I am embarrassed to say, but I have hung up on so many recruiters. Now that I'm on the other side, I apologize to any recruiters that are listening to this. I am sorry. I hung up on you. but yes, one of the challenges in recruiting is, and whether it's me or any other recruiter is you don't know what that opportunity is. So I know that the practices I work with are wonderful. I absolutely do my best to contact people that are correct for the job, but I don't know if you're looking to move. I don't know if you're happy or unhappy and the only way I can know. Is to speak with you so I could not stand recruiters. They would call me on the phone five, six, seven times a day. And oh my goodness. It is so annoying. and so I get that frustration. I have been there. I have maybe sent some mean words once again. I'm so sorry, recruiters. so I get it, there's one recruiter, for some reason, I answered the phone eight years ago and he called me with a job that was the complete opposite of what I was interested in, but he asked me, what do you like about where you're working now? What do you not like? And took note. And then a year later called me with a job that was almost exactly to a T what I was looking for. And yes, recruiters are annoying as heck. And, and they know it, But if you find someone like that, or, like me that have your best interest at heart, what I have for you now may not be the right fit for you, but if I know what you want, you can be the first person I contact when something does come up. and I think something that makes me different is I don't work with just any practice. I really believe in the practices. I work with the physicians that own the practices are wonderful people. I love them all. And some of them inspire me in such interesting and different ways. And they've opened my mind to, different ways of practicing and different ways of seeing patient care. And, they're good kindhearted people who only want what's best for their doctors. And. Those are the practices that I want to put people into, because I know that the practices are doing what they absolutely can to help their physicians personally and professionally.

Dr. Gray, Host 18:08

Wow. I love the contrast that, that you brought up. and it just reminds me of a personal experience that I have not completely related to recruiting. Which is my experience with realtors. So my first, and this is, again, it's very similar. at the end of the day, of a realtor or a recruiter, makes a deal. That's how they, make a living and there's nothing wrong with making a living, especially if you provide value and you help somebody, but it's the, it's the ethics behind it. So the first realtor that I, worked with, my husband and I were looking for a house, for where we, we were gonna move during residency. And it was a difficult market. the houses were quite expensive and not really in a resident salary range. we went and looked at houses with the. realtor anyway. And I told the realtor, we were sitting in his car and chatting and I'm like, these are my pet peeves. I can not live in a house where someone had smoked in, carpet, no, that doesn't work very well for me. Cause the allergies, X, Y, and Z. And so we, so you know, he was there when I said all of these things and it was nodding his head and then we got to later that day, or maybe the next day we got to a house and it was a dump basically, it was, there, you could see like people have punched the walls, the carpet was stained. definitely reeked of smoke and, he took us there and he's I think you guys should make an offer on this place and I'm sorry, it's like when he didn't listen to me or if he didn't care. And two, could it be any more obvious that he just wanted to, get the commission and not really care about, matchmaking to, or rather finding me the right house. And so it's so that, that's an example. and then, fast forward, many years, I had another experience, very different experience with a realtor who and this. So the first guy was a rookie. Okay. So it was like, he was a college grad and it was, I think it was just trying to get something to do and somehow stumbled into this, business. And then this, this most recent realtor I work with is, a pro, like he's been doing this for decades and, very successful realtor. And I, one of the things he actually said to me was, oh yeah, it's never about the deal. It's about the relationship, it's about just, the deal is not nearly as important as the relationship. And he I've at this point, I was of course, very leery of realtors. And, but I, my husband and I said, this is what we want. This is the type of house. And I told this realtor, I'm like, I think it's pretty impossible. Like my husband, his wishlist is crazy. I don't think we can actually find this. And he showed us some houses and, they weren't the right fit. And he was like, okay, no pressure never suggested, oh, go buy this house that we didn't want. And, and maybe it was like a few months later he called us and he said, I have the perfect house for you. It's everything that you wanted. And I'm like, Yeah. you're just saying that you're a salesman. And then he started telling us about it and he's like assignment on the market yet. And he's describing it and I'm like, maybe he's onto something. and again, I was like, I'm not the picky one is my husband's. So go talk to him. And we're like, Yeah, we want to look at this house. And So the first day this house was on the market, cause, as the realtor, he had insider information. Like we went and looked at this house and we put an offer on it. It was, our perfect house. We put an offer on it and that's and help us seal the deal. and I would say without this realtor, we may not actually have gotten the house that we live in right now. And it is the perfect house for us. It's it's not just the house, it's the perfect property, it's everything we wanted. and I would say that realtor, I was so happy. He got the commission, he deserved the commission and more, and that is, that's really about, when you are a broker type of person, what is your goal, right? Is your goal to provide value and to connect opportunities that would never have, Worked out without you being in the picture or is it, are you just there to, make that commission and not care? Whether it, it was actually a good fit.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 22:08

Yeah, I the most important thing by far bar, none is the relationship that I formed with the practices and with the doctors. And I truly have their best interest at heart. I bring that primary care, attitude into what I do now. Because I care, I'm a doctor. I care about people. That's why we went into this field to begin with. And, if I place a doctor in a place that they're not happy, everyone loses. That's not good. The practice won't be happy that doctor won't be happy. And it's a feats, the whole purpose of what I'm doing, which is to help match practices that are a better fit. and I do have that insider information of who's hiring and who's not hiring, or who's thinking about hiring. And just this morning I was contacted by two pediatricians practices that are both in the area that one of the candidates I've been speaking with is looking, they're not hiring yet, but you know that she's going to be the first person that I contacted. What she's looking for, matches what they're looking for. There's certainly a lot of, benefit to working with me or a good recruiter. because we do have that insider information and, in the money side of things, I didn't know when I went into those how much work and how expensive it is to find people. And so for my first client or two, I lost money on those deals. I did not charge them enough. And it's so hard as a new entrepreneur to say, I'm going to charge you money. I'm going to give you the service. And I want money in return. That is the hardest thing that I have had to fight through is tell people this is my price and stick to my guns. But if I don't, I can't do what I'm doing. It's very similar how we say in medicine, you don't pay for the doctors 15 minutes, you pay for the 11 years leading up to those 15 minutes. And so a lot of what I do is, who is in my network, what do I know all of this knowledge that I've accrued over doing this. and that's what you're paying for. It's not necessarily just the matchmaking process as everything on the back end that went into making that match, which sometimes is actually hundreds of hours of work to get that physician that would be the right fit.

Dr. Gray, Host 24:30

But it sounds like what you're doing is amazing. I love that you're starting this and I love that you're disrupting this industry. I think, what the other service that you're providing, which you describe in counseling physicians, helping them figure out what is it that they really want, as you get to know them, that is invaluable because it's, it can save them, a move, it can save them from. Going into the wrong job. And that's the type of value that I think we are happy to pay for. and I know as a physician, we're not directly paying for that, but it's really, the practice that's paying for that, but, in the end it's all, it's it all, it all works out. but I know that I had this pet peeve. I was not recruited by, a recruiter, I directly went, I tried to do most of the direct, direct inquiries, but what you're describing that I think is very valuable and. Especially, if physicians, aren't stuck to one location or, it was just open, like this is the type of practice I want. I'm fairly open in what location, it makes a lot of sense, to work with a recruiter like yourself. now that I've talked to you, I'm thinking, wow, I, I can trust her when you said, or other good recruiters. I'm like, I have no idea how to find another good recruiter, but but at least at least what you're sharing, if that becomes the standard, I think that basically you've changed a whole industry.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 25:57

Yeah, absolutely. And I'll say on that point, I have had my eyes opened to the recruiting world. Couldn't possibly have imagined existed before I came into it with very negative feelings and I've met such incredible people on my journey. And, I have some mentors that if I message them and say, I am struggling, I don't know what to do. They will jump on the phone and help me. And they ask nothing in return. Absolutely nothing. They're just good kindhearted people. And you know what? Those are the people spamming you too, because there's no other way to get your attention. there's the recruiters that give recruiters a bad name and there are good kindhearted people that go into this field because they also want to help people.

Dr. Gray, Host 26:43

So since you are disrupting an industry, why don't you share with, with the audience, your list of things that perhaps we've seen recruiters do, or you've seen recruiters do that don't sit well with.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 26:57

Yeah. So one of the things that. Actually even comes up in the recruiting groups is when recruiters will negotiate a salary offer, that is the lowest they can possibly get away with. that recruiter is not in it for the candidate and that does not give recruiters a good name at all. we need to be fighting for our employees where we're placing them somewhere. and if you're not fighting for your candidates, you are not in it for them. You know, One of the other things that really used to bug me about recruiters is the constant spamming emails, texts, and phone calls. and sometimes it was for practices in a completely different specialty than I am. being on the other side, on the one hand, I can now understand that you're not going to reach people if you don't reach out to them. I apologize if I email you or text you, but if you get an email, be sure to know I'm going to call you. So if you don't want me to call you, just email me back and say, thank you. I'm not interested. And that's okay. you can delete my emails, which is fine. but I won't know that you're not interested unless you let me know. As soon as you let me know, I'm off. But the problem with those constant communications is that you don't know who's on the other side. You don't know if they're a good recruiter. You don't know if they have your best interests at heart. You don't know if they are just trying to fill their quota. Do they have 26 job orders that they're trying to fill? and I can tell you what, some of the big recruiting firms, they have high turnover because their employees aren't happy. how ironic is that? they're not in the business.

Dr. Gray, Host 28:40

culture breeding, toxic culture.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 28:43

Exactly. And if you have someone who's never been in the field recruiting for that field, they have to have a lot of experience. To know exactly who they're talking to and what's going on in that person's life, because it's one thing to hear a doctor say, goodness, I'm so unhappy. I have to work in the critical care all the time because of this pandemic. It's another thing to have worked in the ICU and had to have pronounced a patient dead and to have to tell a family that their family members died. That's a very different experience than knowing intellectually what it feels like to do CPR. And, just imagining, there's being a physician is a very unique experience and unless you've been in these shoes, there is absolutely no way you can possibly understand what we go through.

Dr. Gray, Host 29:35

And that's such a great point. And, I don't know if I expect every, every recruiter to know what I possibly go through, but it's the trust that, they could gain that they have my interest in mind. Cause what, the also the other point that you said about, the ones who negotiate for the lowest salary, that's why it's, we don't automatically trust recruiters because it's not, it's not a given that they have our best intentions in mind and it's like they didn't sign a fiduciary statement. as physicians, we assume that, when we see a patient, we are assuming it's like just given that we have their best interests in mind, but that's not true in other industries.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 30:15

Absolutely. Yeah. and you don't know who they're working for, is the recruiter working for a big system and that's the only company that they recruit for? of course, they're going to get you to that company or is that, a smaller agency that works with multiple different places and they can rather place you in the workplace. and that goes back to knowing what you want to knowing what kind of recruiter you want to work with. If you want to work with a recruiter.

Dr. Gray, Host 30:39

Yeah, I would say those two are, what you had just listed are definitely the, the top pet peeves that I have about recruiters. I think the other one, which you implicitly said there is. that, that high turnover environment where they don't have any experience. So it's what value am I getting? if they don't, they're just kinda trying to figure out how the system works. If they don't even know, what a family physician does or what the difference is between a family physician and an internist, it's if you have to explain to them or maybe you're like, maybe I should explain to them, even though they're not asking, those are not, that's not going to give me a lot of confidence.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 31:16

Yeah, exactly. It certainly helps me when I speak with candidates and practices and they tell me what they are looking for or what they need. there's a lot less words that need to be said.

Dr. Gray, Host 31:26

Yeah, thank you so much for coming on the podcast and just so excited about the work that you're doing and the bigger impact that you are looking to make for physicians. give us some parting words. you said that you've listened to the podcast before. and you've said a lot of great things that are great takeaways for our listeners. for physicians who don't want to just accept a block life who really want to go for their dream life, who realize that they don't necessarily have 20 years to wait that they just want to pursue it as soon as possible? what words of wisdom do you have.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 32:00

Yeah, I think the most important thing is that you have options and you can pursue your dream life and first figure out what is your dream life? What does it look like? And then go from there and your dream life can change. My dream life 10 years ago was very different to my dream life today, but we evolve and we change and we create that life as we go along. So figure out what it is and. Make it happen. We're not stuck. We're not tracked. We can do whatever we need to make things better for ourselves and better for our families. you know that saying, put your oxygen mask on first, before you put it on for your kids. it's absolutely true. You've got to take care of yourself. You've got to find the place that is best for you or create it.

Dr. Gray, Host 32:49

or create it. I love that. Just like you told the, that person to open their practice. Cause that sounded like it was really what they wanted.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 32:56

Oh yeah, absolutely. That person just lit up. There was just no question there. What needed to happen.

Dr. Gray, Host 33:04

Wow. okay. So tell us how to find you and I'm sure there are people who are listening, who are thinking, this sounds really interesting. maybe I'm not looking right now, but I would love to talk to Dr. Laura about, what I'm looking for as far as work and, should I be staying at the place where I am, or, should I be looking at.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 33:24

Yeah, I'm everywhere. the two best places to find me or LinkedIn, my LinkedIn name is Laura Hochman MD, or my website is www dot happy day health dot C O. It is not.com. and you can find me on Facebook. I have a Facebook page, that's happy day health. but LinkedIn and my webpage are where it's at.

Dr. Gray, Host 33:47

Wonderful. And, I do follow your social media handles and, you do the funnest Tik TOK videos. So for if, for anything, if you want to just be amused by Tik TOK videos that are related to work, go subscribe.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 34:01

Yes, please do happy day. MD is my tic-tac handle.

Dr. Gray, Host 34:06

Wonderful. Thank you so much for coming on.

Dr. Hochman, Guest 34:10

Thank you for having me. This was great.