If you work for a living, time and money are always linked, so if you favor one, it comes at the expense of the other.

The mother who chooses to work only part-time is trading income for time with her children. The new business owner who puts in seven-day weeks is giving up personal time to achieve economic liftoff. We make choices like that all the time when we feel the crunch in either money or time.

But what do you do when you feel the crunch in both? What do you do when you can't work less to solve the time-crunch problem because you can't afford to, and you can't work more to solve the cash-crunch because you don't have the time? How do you create choices in that situation?

By increasing the value of your time. Remember, the most fulfilled dentists don't spend more hours in the practice than the less-fulfilled practitioners – in fact, they're more likely to spend less time there. What those dentists (and all really successful people) have mastered is maximizing the earning power of an hour. They understand that their hourly revenue is a result of what dentistry they can do and what patients say yes to, so they are continually working on their clinical and value-creations skills.

I know from long experience that almost any dentist is capable of doing this. Implement a few simple strategies to boost the value of your time and suddenly the pressures on your economic situation and your schedule start to ease up and better choices emerge.