Dentistry as a Hobby?

One of our clients at Spear – someone we have been profiling as part of our effort to document and analyze the success our clients – said something in passing that made me stop and reflect for a moment. He is a specialist leader of a Spear Study Club and he was talking about how impressed he was with how engaged the people in his group were. What made them special, he said, is that compared with many other dentists, they viewed dentistry more as a hobby.

On the surface that might sound strange. If anything, the more committed you are as a dentist the more professional you are. For that matter, there really is no such thing as an amateur dentist who performs dental care as a hobby. Or if there is, I don't want to know about it.

But what this specialist was saying was that the dentists in his group see their careers as more than a job; for them, it is a passion. And when you think about it, that's what hobbies are. They are the things we do not because we have to, but because we want to. It's what occupies our minds in our spare moments and drives our desires. In this sense hobbies represent human curiosity in its purest form. As this client said about his group members: "Dentistry is something they think about even when they are not in the office, and they look forward to getting back to it. Also, they do not mind spending money on something they enjoy, just as you would with a hobby that consumes your interest."

In other words, these are dentists who willingly spend discretionary energy and resources on getting to the next level – and that is an unmistakeable indicator of someone who is bound for success. It's like I always say: Show me how you choose to spend your time and your money and I can tell what is important to you.

If you have a dental degree, you are a professional. But if you really want to reach the highest levels, you have to think of your career as more than a profession. You have to approach it with a special passion. You have to be engaged enough to embrace dentistry not just as your profession, but also as your hobby.