Mentorship is about mutual respect and shared purpose—not hierarchy.
In the Continuing Education Odyssey I went through in the 1980s, rejecting traditional treatment I’d been taught and learning new approaches which made faces more attractive and airways healthier, I learned a lot more than technical information. I wanted the technical information, but some of the “authorities” I was learning from were aloof and didn’t offer any opportunity for true mentorship or personal help for individual cases, questions, or concerns. I felt very much alone on a trip through the orthodontic wilderness without a clear view of what was on the other side, nor a predictable road to get there that had been paved by others. I often felt like everyone else in the class knew more than I did, and I was the only one with questions and concerns. I assumed that the lecturer had mountains of experience and data to support treatment modalities that were being promoted.
In the years since then I have learned that a number of the “experts” had little long-term experience doing what they were teaching but, frankly, felt superior to those they were teaching. Later, they were not open to suggestions I came up with based on my own experience decades after I had taken their courses. As the years went by, I determined that some of the “experts” I had learned from had actually gone back to teaching the same traditional dogma from traditional orthodontic curricula!
In those early years, I never imagined that one day I would be teaching others myself. But after years of my own growth and experience in doing new treatments, I finally decided that I needed to teach others what I had pretty much learned on my own in the “School of Hard Knocks.” I had determined what worked, what didn’t work, and I had long-term proof of the effectiveness of what I was doing.
At the same time, I realized that many of the people who were participants in my courses had far more knowledge than I did in other areas. I realized that those I was teaching often had plenty that I could benefit from as I sought to help them. This is how I developed the idea that a true mentorship requires treating others as colleagues rather than students. Under those circumstances, everyone benefited. This openness with those in my mentorship benefited them AND me greatly. I was quite open in discussing obstacles in the treatment regimens that I was using and letting them all know that I did NOT have all the answers. In the early years of the mentorship, this openness resulted in two separate doctors coming up with suggestions that literally revolutionized what I was doing. I happily incorporated their suggestions in teaching others, and I ALWAYS give them credit for their suggestions—even naming one technique after the doctor who made the suggestion! This openness has served me very well, with participants not being reluctant to ask questions or make suggestions.
In Zoom interviews with potential new participants in my mentorship, I routinely hear people mention specific courses they have taken and how they end up NOT truly knowing what to do, nor how to do it. They’ve spent a lot of money but are not in a position to deliver any treatment in a predictable fashion which makes them confident. They may have tried things but were unable to get any help, answers to questions, or any feedback from the person from whom they took the course. This helps me understand just how important our mentorship is with an online forum to post cases for me to comment on before any treatment is done, during the treatment, and after the treatment. I want doctors in my mentorship to learn at every stage of treatment and someday innovate and elevate what we are currently doing to something better!
It is my goal to teach others to diagnose, treatment plan, and confidently treat patients with what I’ve been fortunate enough to learn from my experience. Complimenting my participants on their diagnostic capabilities, their understanding of the treatment approaches, and their ability to execute successfully is something we do daily when posts are made on our forum. I continue to learn in this process and am able to provide a far better outcome for everyone in the process.
Recently, one of my absolute best participants said to me, “We need to clone you!” That was the highest compliment I could receive and something that keeps me going trying to do better for each participant. It is my hope that I may in a way actually be cloning myself by motivating others to improve on the current state of the art.
