March 12, 2025 • 20 mins
Your body language might be sabotaging your case acceptance without you even realizing it. Imagine presenting the perfect treatment plan with flawless explanation—only to have patients hesitate and "think about it." What went wrong?
The answer lies in the subtle realm of nonverbal communication. Research shows our brains are 12.5 times more likely to believe body language over words, and a staggering 82% of first impressions depend entirely on nonverbal cues. These hidden signals determine whether patients perceive you as trustworthy and competent—or not.
Drawing from Vanessa Van Edwards' groundbreaking book "Cues," this episode breaks down five powerful techniques to transform your patient interactions. You'll discover the critical link between open hand gestures and trust, learn the "shoulder-to-earlobe rule" for projecting confidence, master the perfect balance of eye contact, practice the engagement-signaling "lower lid flex," and understand the charisma-building "first liker advantage."
Try incorporating just one new cue per day into your patient interactions and watch as engagement improves. These subtle shifts in body language could be the missing piece in your case acceptance puzzle, helping more patients say "yes" to the treatment they truly need.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Now imagine you're in a consultation, you're
presenting a treatment plan to asomewhat hesitant patient.
Now you might be saying all theright things, you're explaining
the benefits, you're breakingdown the procedure, you're
talking about what's going tohappen if they don't do the
treatment, but something stillisn't clicking.
What is it?
They hesitate, they want tothink about it and you feel like
you blew the case.
(00:23):
What if I told you, the issueisn't what you're saying, but
it's the way that you're sayingit.
And, more importantly, what isyour body signaling to the
patient?
In today's episode, we're goingto dive into the hidden
language of cues and how subtlebody language, vocal tones and
even the smallest gestures canmake or break trust and
ultimately, impact caseacceptance.
(00:44):
We're also going to break downthe differences between males
and females and how we can usedifferent cues to signal warmth
and competence, based on wherewe fall along the spectrum.
This is one that you're notgoing to want to miss.
Let's get to it.
You are listening to DentalPractice Heroes, where we help
you create and scale your dentalpractice so that you are no
(01:04):
longer tied to the chair.
I'm Dr Paul Etcheson, author oftwo books on dental practice
management, dental coach andowner of a $6 million group
practice in the suburbs ofChicago.
I want to teach you how to growand systematize your dental
practice so you can spend lesstime practicing and more time
enjoying a life that you love.
Let's get started.
Time enjoying a life that youlove let's get started.
(01:30):
So welcome back to the DentalPractice Heroes podcast.
I'm so happy that you're herewith me today, hey, and if you
like what you're hearing, wouldyou tell a friend about it or
leave a five-star review onwhatever app you're using to
listen to podcasts?
It would really help spread theword and I would so much
appreciate it.
So today let's talk about cues.
I want to tell you a storyabout an associate that I had at
one time.
Super nice person, great persondidn't work out at my office.
(01:53):
I know that she's working outat some other office.
It just didn't work out.
Let me tell you why.
This was someone who I spent alot of time coaching with.
There's a lot of time mentoringwith and a lot of it was
communication-based and I wouldsit there and listen outside the
room and I listened when shewas talking to new patients and
often, for some reason, it justcame off.
(02:16):
No matter what she said.
It came off a little cold, likea little sterile, and my team
noticed it too.
They were like, hey, I don'tthink she's really providing the
patient experience we're usedto at here.
I think you need to work withher.
I think you need to talk to herabout her new patient
experience.
And we did this, and she took alot of notes and she tried ever,
ever so hard, but the problemwas it wasn't what she was
(02:38):
saying.
I could give her the words, butI couldn't teach her how to say
them.
So let me give you two exampleshere.
I'm going to say the samestatement, same words, but I'm
going to say it two completelydifferent ways and you can
decide which dentist are youmore likely to say yes to.
So I'm telling the patientabout what a crown is, that they
(02:58):
got a crack in tooth and weneed to get a crown on it, okay.
So, hey, mr Jones, a crown is aprotective cover, like a helmet
for your tooth.
And this tooth it's got a crackin it and it's going to get
worse and we need to get a crownon this tooth before it breaks
completely.
Okay, all right.
So that's the first one.
A crown is essentially aprotective cover, like a helmet
(03:20):
for your tooth.
Now, this tooth here, it's gota crack in it and it's going to
get worse.
We need to get a crown on thistooth before it breaks
completely.
Which one of those sounded moreconfident?
Which one are you more likelyto trust?
Which dentist?
I mean same dentist, they wereboth me, but one.
You know it sounded unsure.
There was a lot of like tone,inflection that was going up,
(03:42):
like this is a crown, it's likea helmet for your tooth, instead
of like it's like a helmet foryour tooth.
The pitch went up instead ofdown.
So that is just a great exampleof how that tone, that
inflection going up sounds likea question, going down Sounds
like a statement.
Going up Sounds unsure.
Going down Sounds very sure.
(04:02):
So this is just a short exampleand this was the stuff that I
just couldn't teach to thisperson.
And recently I read a book byVanessa Van Edwards.
It's called Cues.
Now, cues not like the letter,like C-U-E-S, and it's a great
book and I loved her first book,captivate.
But I didn't read this bookbecause I was like, ah, it
(04:23):
doesn't sound that cool.
But when I started reading it Iwas like, oh, my gosh, this is
so applicable to dentistry.
Like this is this, is it?
This is what I could not teachto this associate.
I could not get her treatmentacceptance up and why she was
often getting like negativereviews from patients because
they weren't feeling the warmth,they weren't feeling the
(04:43):
competence that came from thisperson.
Now, I have no doubt she wasvery competent.
It was just she couldn't conveyit to the patient and it had
nothing to do with the words, ithad all to do with the
nonverbals.
So one thing that the researchshows and this came from the
book is that our brain is 12 anda half times more likely to
believe nonverbal gestures overthe words.
(05:04):
Now, if you listen to thispodcast, you know that I am big
on the words.
I'm so big on verbiage.
I love, love, love hearing fromother dentists Like how do you
explain this to a patient,because that has always been
really helpful to me.
But what I'm realizing afterreading this book is that it's
just important to train how tosay it versus what to say.
Another stat from the book 82%of first impressions are
(05:26):
dependent on non-verbals.
82% first impressions and youcan make a first impression just
like that.
How many chances do you get tomake a first impression?
Well, it's a first impression,guess?
The answer one yeah, you onlyget one.
Make it count.
So we are sitting there in thedental chair, we're talking to
patients and we're supposed tobe trustworthy, we're supposed
to show competence.
(05:47):
If our body language and thetone in our voice is not
matching our words, somethinggoes up in the patient's head,
an alarm goes off that sayssomething is not right.
I don't know what it is, but Idon't trust this person and I
don't want to do what they'resaying.
Now, I'm not saying we'resupposed to be tricking our
patients into saying yes.
(06:08):
That's not what I'm saying atall.
What I am saying is that if wewant our patients to get healthy
, we have to say things in a waythat makes them say yes to
treatment.
We need to treatment planethically.
You know, don't make things up,but we need to present it in a
way that they can say yes.
So in this episode I want to gothrough five cues that are going
to help your trust in your caseacceptance, and you can turn
(06:29):
around and use these with yourpatients today.
And then I'm going to breakdown, males and females, what
you can try differently, and itmight not even be males and
females.
It might be like the masculineversus the feminine.
All right, let's talk about thefirst one the power of your
hands.
What should we be doing withour hands?
You guys remember TalladegaNights when Will Ferrell's like
(06:50):
talking, his hands keep comingup.
He's like I don't know what todo with my hands.
I don't know what to do.
I don't know what to do with myhands so often.
Sometimes, when I'muncomfortable, I don't know.
I'll stick them in my pocket.
Do you leave a thumb out you,your back?
Sometimes it feels good tocross your arms.
(07:11):
That's not good posture, it'snot good body language.
But have you ever been in asocial situation where you've
been unsure and you don't knowwhat to do with your hands?
Yeah, me too.
Have you ever been in asituation where you felt super
confident and you were thinkingabout what should I do with my
hands?
Probably not.
You weren't even thinking aboutit.
So, these damn hands on bothsides of our body, connected to
our shoulders, what the hell dowe do with them?
One of the things that, if youlook at these TED Talks and
these very effective TED Talkspeakers, you will see a lot of
(07:31):
hand gesturing, a lot of openhand gestures.
So what they're doing is theygot their palms up to the
ceiling and they're stickingthem out like listen to me, this
is going to change everything.
That's what they say, andthey're gesturing with their
hands.
So when you want to communicateto a patient, get those hands
moving.
Get them to where the patientcan see them and get them moving
(07:54):
, because one of the thingsthat's evolutionary is that when
we can see someone's hands,they are not a threat to us.
So we don't want to hide ourhands.
We want our hands out in theopen, we want to be gesturing
with them, and I think one waythat often doctors will hide
their hands is if they've got arouter sheet or a clipboard or
some people might have the oldschool charts is they're sitting
(08:15):
there and they got it in frontof them and they're kind of
hiding behind that.
So notice that, these littlecues that you might be sending
to your patients, that you mightnot be thinking anything of and
they might be deep downsubconsciously to help you feel
better in a nervous situation,but you need to stop them
because they make a difference.
So next time you do a treatmentplan.
Be conscious of your hands.
What are they doing?
Don't hide them and get thosegesturants going.
(08:38):
You'd be all like my Italianin-laws man.
We're throwing the hands upeverywhere.
What's going on?
You know that's my wife'sfamily, that is how they
actually talk, first generationimmigrants, and but they're cool
, they're good to me, all right.
Next thing, number two, we'retalking about the shoulder to
the earlobe rule.
You know this is a confidencecue.
What is the distance between myshoulder and my earlobe?
(09:01):
There's a direct link betweenconfidence and the distance
between those two.
Now I think of a nervous person.
A nervous dentist wants toshrink in.
They're raising their shoulders.
They're kind of creating asmall presence.
They're getting smaller.
They're bringing the shoulderscloser to the earlobes.
The confidence dentist issomeone who keeps their
shoulders relaxed and backthey're naturally lowered, which
(09:24):
that expresses that expertise,that control, that you know what
you're doing and you knowwhat's best for the patient.
So it's a tiny littleadjustment Keep those shoulders
back, sit up straight and makesure that there's a long
distance, as long as possible,from your earlobes to your
shoulders.
All right, number three I'mgoing to open up with a story.
I have somebody I know that Ilike a lot, really nice dude,
(09:48):
very cool.
I've been golfing with them,I've had really great
conversations with them, butthere's just always been
something about him that irks me, and I don't know what it is.
I, for some reason, I feeluncomfortable, like I get
nervous around this person, andI couldn't figure out what it
was.
When I read this in this book Isaid my God, this is what it is
Eye contact.
(10:09):
This person makes way too mucheye contact.
Now, you may have never thoughtof this before.
When you're listening to aspeaker, you are to be making
eye contact as the listener, butwhen you are talking, you are
not to make 100% eye contact.
You're supposed to look away,formulate your ideas and look
every now and then, like lookingabout half of the like, maybe
(10:31):
60% of the time, you're makingeye contact because you're
looking away to think Now thisperson, when they talk, they
never break eye contact.
Now that I said this, you'regoing to catch it in people,
because when somebody's speakingto you and they don't break eye
contact, it feels a lot ofpressure and you might be like
me, thinking in the back of yourmind look at their eyes, look
at their eyes, make eye contact.
(10:53):
Pretend you're listening, lookat both eyes at the same time.
Or look at the left eye, lookat the right eye.
Can they tell that I'm lookingat one eye versus the other?
What am I even listening to?
Do you do this?
So here's the hack Try topractice making eye contact at
the end of your sentences, like,okay, we're looking away.
A crown is like a helmet eyecontact, you know it protects
your tooth from breaking eyecontact.
(11:15):
So it's like you're thinkingyou're looking away and you're
not looking down.
When you're thinking You'relooking over, You're looking to
the side, you're looking overthe person's shoulder, you're
looking.
You know you don't look downDown, looks non-confident.
So practice making eye contact.
Now, these are things that aregoing to be hard to think about
if you're trying to act naturalwhen you're talking to the
(11:36):
patients, but they are thingsthat you can practice when
you're not talking to patientsso that you can be better when
you are talking to patients,because it's hard enough to
listen and be engaged and actnaturally.
And now I'm going to give youall these things to think about.
All right, number four this iscalled the lower lid flex, and
who doesn't love a good flex?
So what this is.
(11:57):
I want you to picture likeyou're kind of squinting but
you're not looking into the sun.
You're just kind of squinting alittle bit.
You're closing your eyes alittle bit.
Now imagine the expression.
What would happen to your eyesif I was telling you something
right now and you were justnodding your head and you go oh,
yeah, he's right, yeah, he'stotally right.
(12:18):
Think about what's happening toyour eyes, not really like
enthusiastic.
Yeah, all right, that is thelower lid flex.
It's just a slight lower lidcomes up a little bit and it's
like you're really engaged,you're confident and you're
really engaged on what thatperson is saying.
So try doing that with a littlebit of nodding when they're
telling you stuff, like you'rereally thinking about it.
(12:39):
You're sorting out all thisinformation.
Yeah, yeah, okay, mr Patient,wow, yeah, tell me about, like
tell me about, the dentist thattook your tooth out and put his
knee into your chest.
Yeah, okay, this is wow, thisis so interesting.
So another thing you can do iswhen you're listening is kind of
tip your head to the side thatwas another interesting cue I
read in the book is like almostlike you're putting your ear one
ear up so you can focus, you'relike yeah, combine that with a
(13:02):
lower lid flex.
Number five the first likeradvantage they talked about in
this book, this study thatlooked at popular high school
kids and this is what they foundwhy were these kids so popular
and why are they so charismatic?
And what they found was that alot of these really popular
(13:22):
charismatic kids, they likedeverybody.
They like more people, they aremore accepting and they're more
.
They just have more friendsbecause they like more people.
So be the first to like yourfellow patient, be the first to
smile big, the first to greetenthusiastically, the first to
engage and stick your hand outand say how you doing.
(13:44):
Mr Jones, hi, I'm Dr Edgerton,so nice to meet you.
Welcome to the practice.
Now.
I promised you we would talkabout the difference between
males and females.
Now in this book, vanessa VanEdwards, she talks about what is
charisma and in her opinion,charisma is warmth and
competence.
How can you convey warmth andcompetence?
(14:05):
The thing that she mentionsbetween the sexes is that often
males are better atcommunicating competence but not
so good at communicating warmth.
In females it comes verynatural to communicate the
warmth but not so much thecompetence.
Now, don't get me wrong.
I'm saying you can.
There's a spectrum here, guys.
(14:25):
Okay, if you find yourselflacking on communicating warmth,
you might want to use some morewarmth cues.
If you find yourself lacking onthe competence side, you might
find yourself trying to use morecompetence cues.
You're trying to make up forsomething that naturally doesn't
come to you.
So let's talk about the maledentists who need to convey more
(14:46):
warmth.
They can smile more.
Men don't smile as much aswomen, right?
So smile more, get thatenthusiasm.
You're going to use those openhand gestures because you know
that communicates that warmththere.
And you really want to varyyour vocal tone.
You know men sometimes speakvery monotone and especially
they don't have a lot ofenthusiasm in their voice.
(15:08):
You want to bring thatenthusiasm out.
So you want to use that vocalinstrument up and down and you
want to use pitches and you wantto use it for hesitation.
Then you'd bring it down, likewhen you make that big point.
You know you want to use yourvocal tone.
And another thing is leaning inslightly when the patient is
talking.
This shows that you genuinelycare.
(15:30):
It shows that you're beingattentive.
So, guys, try that out.
All right For the ladies wenaturally will communicate
warmth, but we need might need alittle help on the competence.
Okay, not saying you'reincompetent, just saying like
communicating it through bodylanguage.
So what we can do is we canlower the pitch of our voice
slightly.
I'm not talking about likeyou're going to be like the tall
(15:50):
dude from boys to men, baby I'mso sorry baby and they're not
like that guy.
Okay, you don't have to getthat low, but using a lower
voice can have you communicatingwith a little bit more
competence.
People with higher pitch voicesthey do these studies and they
show something in our brain saysthis person doesn't know as
much as someone else who has alower voice.
(16:11):
Okay, so you just know that atrap that women can get into is
nodding too much.
So you want to avoid thatexcessive nodding when the
patient's telling you things orwhen you're explaining treatment
plans, because that canundermine your authority when
you're speaking.
So avoid that nodding.
The eye contact thing Womentypically will look down more
(16:32):
when speaking, when explainingthings and, like I said, looking
down immediately gives lessperceived authority.
So make sure that you've gotthat eye contact down, make sure
it's not too much.
But when you look away, you'relooking off to the side or over.
You're not looking down.
And the last one take up morespace.
You know sitting upright.
You know sitting up right.
You know expanding your posture, like you're like a big peacock
(16:54):
, like you're spreading out yourfeathers.
You're taking up more space.
You want to be big.
You know how, like when you thebear attack, you're supposed to
make yourself big.
Get as big as you can.
Okay, I'm not saying like yougot to sit up and like, just
take up a little bit more space,as much as you can.
These things matter.
And if you really want to readmore, man, this was such a good
book.
I thought it was such aninteresting read.
It really blew me away.
(17:16):
Accused by Vanessa Van Edwards.
I think these are the sort ofthings that if you record your
case presentations, you're goingto see these things.
And now that I gave you somethings to kind of think about,
maybe you'll catch yourselfdoing these.
And if you want more casepresentation, training man, in
the Hero Collective you get allthe training videos and there's
so much information on casepresentation, not only for you
(17:37):
as the doctor or the hygienistor the clinical team, but also a
lot for your front desk team.
So check that out on thewebsite dentalpracticeheroescom.
Now, when you go into yourpractice today, I want you to
pay attention to just one ofthose cues I shared with you.
Watch how your patientinteractions change and, if you
want more practice, tryincorporating one cue per day
(17:57):
into your interactions and seeif you feel like your patients
become more engaged.
Thank you so much for listeningtoday.
I so appreciate you taking mewith you to do whatever you're
doing, whether that be drivingto the office, working out or
just doing things around thehouse.
I hope you have a great weekand we will talk to you next
time.
Now imagine you're in a consultation, you're
presenting a treatment plan to asomewhat hesitant patient.
Now you might be saying all theright things, you're explaining
the benefits, you're breakingdown the procedure, you're
talking about what's going tohappen if they don't do the
treatment, but something stillisn't clicking.
What is it?
They hesitate, they want tothink about it and you feel like
you blew the case.
(00:23):
What if I told you, the issueisn't what you're saying, but
it's the way that you're sayingit.
And, more importantly, what isyour body signaling to the
patient?
In today's episode, we're goingto dive into the hidden
language of cues and how subtlebody language, vocal tones and
even the smallest gestures canmake or break trust and
ultimately, impact caseacceptance.
(00:44):
We're also going to break downthe differences between males
and females and how we can usedifferent cues to signal warmth
and competence, based on wherewe fall along the spectrum.
This is one that you're notgoing to want to miss.
Let's get to it.
You are listening to DentalPractice Heroes, where we help
you create and scale your dentalpractice so that you are no
(01:04):
longer tied to the chair.
I'm Dr Paul Etcheson, author oftwo books on dental practice
management, dental coach andowner of a $6 million group
practice in the suburbs ofChicago.
I want to teach you how to growand systematize your dental
practice so you can spend lesstime practicing and more time
enjoying a life that you love.
Let's get started.
Time enjoying a life that youlove let's get started.
(01:30):
So welcome back to the DentalPractice Heroes podcast.
I'm so happy that you're herewith me today, hey, and if you
like what you're hearing, wouldyou tell a friend about it or
leave a five-star review onwhatever app you're using to
listen to podcasts?
It would really help spread theword and I would so much
appreciate it.
So today let's talk about cues.
I want to tell you a storyabout an associate that I had at
one time.
Super nice person, great persondidn't work out at my office.
(01:53):
I know that she's working outat some other office.
It just didn't work out.
Let me tell you why.
This was someone who I spent alot of time coaching with.
There's a lot of time mentoringwith and a lot of it was
communication-based and I wouldsit there and listen outside the
room and I listened when shewas talking to new patients and
often, for some reason, it justcame off.
(02:16):
No matter what she said.
It came off a little cold, likea little sterile, and my team
noticed it too.
They were like, hey, I don'tthink she's really providing the
patient experience we're usedto at here.
I think you need to work withher.
I think you need to talk to herabout her new patient
experience.
And we did this, and she took alot of notes and she tried ever,
ever so hard, but the problemwas it wasn't what she was
(02:38):
saying.
I could give her the words, butI couldn't teach her how to say
them.
So let me give you two exampleshere.
I'm going to say the samestatement, same words, but I'm
going to say it two completelydifferent ways and you can
decide which dentist are youmore likely to say yes to.
So I'm telling the patientabout what a crown is, that they
(02:58):
got a crack in tooth and weneed to get a crown on it, okay.
So, hey, mr Jones, a crown is aprotective cover, like a helmet
for your tooth.
And this tooth it's got a crackin it and it's going to get
worse and we need to get a crownon this tooth before it breaks
completely.
Okay, all right.
So that's the first one.
A crown is essentially aprotective cover, like a helmet
(03:20):
for your tooth.
Now, this tooth here, it's gota crack in it and it's going to
get worse.
We need to get a crown on thistooth before it breaks
completely.
Which one of those sounded moreconfident?
Which one are you more likelyto trust?
Which dentist?
I mean same dentist, they wereboth me, but one.
You know it sounded unsure.
There was a lot of like tone,inflection that was going up,
(03:42):
like this is a crown, it's likea helmet for your tooth, instead
of like it's like a helmet foryour tooth.
The pitch went up instead ofdown.
So that is just a great exampleof how that tone, that
inflection going up sounds likea question, going down Sounds
like a statement.
Going up Sounds unsure.
Going down Sounds very sure.
(04:02):
So this is just a short exampleand this was the stuff that I
just couldn't teach to thisperson.
And recently I read a book byVanessa Van Edwards.
It's called Cues.
Now, cues not like the letter,like C-U-E-S, and it's a great
book and I loved her first book,captivate.
But I didn't read this bookbecause I was like, ah, it
(04:23):
doesn't sound that cool.
But when I started reading it Iwas like, oh, my gosh, this is
so applicable to dentistry.
Like this is this, is it?
This is what I could not teachto this associate.
I could not get her treatmentacceptance up and why she was
often getting like negativereviews from patients because
they weren't feeling the warmth,they weren't feeling the
(04:43):
competence that came from thisperson.
Now, I have no doubt she wasvery competent.
It was just she couldn't conveyit to the patient and it had
nothing to do with the words, ithad all to do with the
nonverbals.
So one thing that the researchshows and this came from the
book is that our brain is 12 anda half times more likely to
believe nonverbal gestures overthe words.
(05:04):
Now, if you listen to thispodcast, you know that I am big
on the words.
I'm so big on verbiage.
I love, love, love hearing fromother dentists Like how do you
explain this to a patient,because that has always been
really helpful to me.
But what I'm realizing afterreading this book is that it's
just important to train how tosay it versus what to say.
Another stat from the book 82%of first impressions are
(05:26):
dependent on non-verbals.
82% first impressions and youcan make a first impression just
like that.
How many chances do you get tomake a first impression?
Well, it's a first impression,guess?
The answer one yeah, you onlyget one.
Make it count.
So we are sitting there in thedental chair, we're talking to
patients and we're supposed tobe trustworthy, we're supposed
to show competence.
(05:47):
If our body language and thetone in our voice is not
matching our words, somethinggoes up in the patient's head,
an alarm goes off that sayssomething is not right.
I don't know what it is, but Idon't trust this person and I
don't want to do what they'resaying.
Now, I'm not saying we'resupposed to be tricking our
patients into saying yes.
(06:08):
That's not what I'm saying atall.
What I am saying is that if wewant our patients to get healthy
, we have to say things in a waythat makes them say yes to
treatment.
We need to treatment planethically.
You know, don't make things up,but we need to present it in a
way that they can say yes.
So in this episode I want to gothrough five cues that are going
to help your trust in your caseacceptance, and you can turn
(06:29):
around and use these with yourpatients today.
And then I'm going to breakdown, males and females, what
you can try differently, and itmight not even be males and
females.
It might be like the masculineversus the feminine.
All right, let's talk about thefirst one the power of your
hands.
What should we be doing withour hands?
You guys remember TalladegaNights when Will Ferrell's like
(06:50):
talking, his hands keep comingup.
He's like I don't know what todo with my hands.
I don't know what to do.
I don't know what to do with myhands so often.
Sometimes, when I'muncomfortable, I don't know.
I'll stick them in my pocket.
Do you leave a thumb out you,your back?
Sometimes it feels good tocross your arms.
(07:11):
That's not good posture, it'snot good body language.
But have you ever been in asocial situation where you've
been unsure and you don't knowwhat to do with your hands?
Yeah, me too.
Have you ever been in asituation where you felt super
confident and you were thinkingabout what should I do with my
hands?
Probably not.
You weren't even thinking aboutit.
So, these damn hands on bothsides of our body, connected to
our shoulders, what the hell dowe do with them?
One of the things that, if youlook at these TED Talks and
these very effective TED Talkspeakers, you will see a lot of
(07:31):
hand gesturing, a lot of openhand gestures.
So what they're doing is theygot their palms up to the
ceiling and they're stickingthem out like listen to me, this
is going to change everything.
That's what they say, andthey're gesturing with their
hands.
So when you want to communicateto a patient, get those hands
moving.
Get them to where the patientcan see them and get them moving
(07:54):
, because one of the thingsthat's evolutionary is that when
we can see someone's hands,they are not a threat to us.
So we don't want to hide ourhands.
We want our hands out in theopen, we want to be gesturing
with them, and I think one waythat often doctors will hide
their hands is if they've got arouter sheet or a clipboard or
some people might have the oldschool charts is they're sitting
(08:15):
there and they got it in frontof them and they're kind of
hiding behind that.
So notice that, these littlecues that you might be sending
to your patients, that you mightnot be thinking anything of and
they might be deep downsubconsciously to help you feel
better in a nervous situation,but you need to stop them
because they make a difference.
So next time you do a treatmentplan.
Be conscious of your hands.
What are they doing?
Don't hide them and get thosegesturants going.
(08:38):
You'd be all like my Italianin-laws man.
We're throwing the hands upeverywhere.
What's going on?
You know that's my wife'sfamily, that is how they
actually talk, first generationimmigrants, and but they're cool
, they're good to me, all right.
Next thing, number two, we'retalking about the shoulder to
the earlobe rule.
You know this is a confidencecue.
What is the distance between myshoulder and my earlobe?
(09:01):
There's a direct link betweenconfidence and the distance
between those two.
Now I think of a nervous person.
A nervous dentist wants toshrink in.
They're raising their shoulders.
They're kind of creating asmall presence.
They're getting smaller.
They're bringing the shoulderscloser to the earlobes.
The confidence dentist issomeone who keeps their
shoulders relaxed and backthey're naturally lowered, which
(09:24):
that expresses that expertise,that control, that you know what
you're doing and you knowwhat's best for the patient.
So it's a tiny littleadjustment Keep those shoulders
back, sit up straight and makesure that there's a long
distance, as long as possible,from your earlobes to your
shoulders.
All right, number three I'mgoing to open up with a story.
I have somebody I know that Ilike a lot, really nice dude,
(09:48):
very cool.
I've been golfing with them,I've had really great
conversations with them, butthere's just always been
something about him that irks me, and I don't know what it is.
I, for some reason, I feeluncomfortable, like I get
nervous around this person, andI couldn't figure out what it
was.
When I read this in this book Isaid my God, this is what it is
Eye contact.
(10:09):
This person makes way too mucheye contact.
Now, you may have never thoughtof this before.
When you're listening to aspeaker, you are to be making
eye contact as the listener, butwhen you are talking, you are
not to make 100% eye contact.
You're supposed to look away,formulate your ideas and look
every now and then, like lookingabout half of the like, maybe
(10:31):
60% of the time, you're makingeye contact because you're
looking away to think Now thisperson, when they talk, they
never break eye contact.
Now that I said this, you'regoing to catch it in people,
because when somebody's speakingto you and they don't break eye
contact, it feels a lot ofpressure and you might be like
me, thinking in the back of yourmind look at their eyes, look
at their eyes, make eye contact.
(10:53):
Pretend you're listening, lookat both eyes at the same time.
Or look at the left eye, lookat the right eye.
Can they tell that I'm lookingat one eye versus the other?
What am I even listening to?
Do you do this?
So here's the hack Try topractice making eye contact at
the end of your sentences, like,okay, we're looking away.
A crown is like a helmet eyecontact, you know it protects
your tooth from breaking eyecontact.
(11:15):
So it's like you're thinkingyou're looking away and you're
not looking down.
When you're thinking You'relooking over, You're looking to
the side, you're looking overthe person's shoulder, you're
looking.
You know you don't look downDown, looks non-confident.
So practice making eye contact.
Now, these are things that aregoing to be hard to think about
if you're trying to act naturalwhen you're talking to the
(11:36):
patients, but they are thingsthat you can practice when
you're not talking to patientsso that you can be better when
you are talking to patients,because it's hard enough to
listen and be engaged and actnaturally.
And now I'm going to give youall these things to think about.
All right, number four this iscalled the lower lid flex, and
who doesn't love a good flex?
So what this is.
(11:57):
I want you to picture likeyou're kind of squinting but
you're not looking into the sun.
You're just kind of squinting alittle bit.
You're closing your eyes alittle bit.
Now imagine the expression.
What would happen to your eyesif I was telling you something
right now and you were justnodding your head and you go oh,
yeah, he's right, yeah, he'stotally right.
(12:18):
Think about what's happening toyour eyes, not really like
enthusiastic.
Yeah, all right, that is thelower lid flex.
It's just a slight lower lidcomes up a little bit and it's
like you're really engaged,you're confident and you're
really engaged on what thatperson is saying.
So try doing that with a littlebit of nodding when they're
telling you stuff, like you'rereally thinking about it.
(12:39):
You're sorting out all thisinformation.
Yeah, yeah, okay, mr Patient,wow, yeah, tell me about, like
tell me about, the dentist thattook your tooth out and put his
knee into your chest.
Yeah, okay, this is wow, thisis so interesting.
So another thing you can do iswhen you're listening is kind of
tip your head to the side thatwas another interesting cue I
read in the book is like almostlike you're putting your ear one
ear up so you can focus, you'relike yeah, combine that with a
(13:02):
lower lid flex.
Number five the first likeradvantage they talked about in
this book, this study thatlooked at popular high school
kids and this is what they foundwhy were these kids so popular
and why are they so charismatic?
And what they found was that alot of these really popular
(13:22):
charismatic kids, they likedeverybody.
They like more people, they aremore accepting and they're more
.
They just have more friendsbecause they like more people.
So be the first to like yourfellow patient, be the first to
smile big, the first to greetenthusiastically, the first to
engage and stick your hand outand say how you doing.
(13:44):
Mr Jones, hi, I'm Dr Edgerton,so nice to meet you.
Welcome to the practice.
Now.
I promised you we would talkabout the difference between
males and females.
Now in this book, vanessa VanEdwards, she talks about what is
charisma and in her opinion,charisma is warmth and
competence.
How can you convey warmth andcompetence?
(14:05):
The thing that she mentionsbetween the sexes is that often
males are better atcommunicating competence but not
so good at communicating warmth.
In females it comes verynatural to communicate the
warmth but not so much thecompetence.
Now, don't get me wrong.
I'm saying you can.
There's a spectrum here, guys.
(14:25):
Okay, if you find yourselflacking on communicating warmth,
you might want to use some morewarmth cues.
If you find yourself lacking onthe competence side, you might
find yourself trying to use morecompetence cues.
You're trying to make up forsomething that naturally doesn't
come to you.
So let's talk about the maledentists who need to convey more
(14:46):
warmth.
They can smile more.
Men don't smile as much aswomen, right?
So smile more, get thatenthusiasm.
You're going to use those openhand gestures because you know
that communicates that warmththere.
And you really want to varyyour vocal tone.
You know men sometimes speakvery monotone and especially
they don't have a lot ofenthusiasm in their voice.
(15:08):
You want to bring thatenthusiasm out.
So you want to use that vocalinstrument up and down and you
want to use pitches and you wantto use it for hesitation.
Then you'd bring it down, likewhen you make that big point.
You know you want to use yourvocal tone.
And another thing is leaning inslightly when the patient is
talking.
This shows that you genuinelycare.
(15:30):
It shows that you're beingattentive.
So, guys, try that out.
All right For the ladies wenaturally will communicate
warmth, but we need might need alittle help on the competence.
Okay, not saying you'reincompetent, just saying like
communicating it through bodylanguage.
So what we can do is we canlower the pitch of our voice
slightly.
I'm not talking about likeyou're going to be like the tall
(15:50):
dude from boys to men, baby I'mso sorry baby and they're not
like that guy.
Okay, you don't have to getthat low, but using a lower
voice can have you communicatingwith a little bit more
competence.
People with higher pitch voicesthey do these studies and they
show something in our brain saysthis person doesn't know as
much as someone else who has alower voice.
(16:11):
Okay, so you just know that atrap that women can get into is
nodding too much.
So you want to avoid thatexcessive nodding when the
patient's telling you things orwhen you're explaining treatment
plans, because that canundermine your authority when
you're speaking.
So avoid that nodding.
The eye contact thing Womentypically will look down more
(16:32):
when speaking, when explainingthings and, like I said, looking
down immediately gives lessperceived authority.
So make sure that you've gotthat eye contact down, make sure
it's not too much.
But when you look away, you'relooking off to the side or over.
You're not looking down.
And the last one take up morespace.
You know sitting upright.
You know sitting up right.
You know expanding your posture, like you're like a big peacock
(16:54):
, like you're spreading out yourfeathers.
You're taking up more space.
You want to be big.
You know how, like when you thebear attack, you're supposed to
make yourself big.
Get as big as you can.
Okay, I'm not saying like yougot to sit up and like, just
take up a little bit more space,as much as you can.
These things matter.
And if you really want to readmore, man, this was such a good
book.
I thought it was such aninteresting read.
It really blew me away.
(17:16):
Accused by Vanessa Van Edwards.
I think these are the sort ofthings that if you record your
case presentations, you're goingto see these things.
And now that I gave you somethings to kind of think about,
maybe you'll catch yourselfdoing these.
And if you want more casepresentation, training man, in
the Hero Collective you get allthe training videos and there's
so much information on casepresentation, not only for you
(17:37):
as the doctor or the hygienistor the clinical team, but also a
lot for your front desk team.
So check that out on thewebsite dentalpracticeheroescom.
Now, when you go into yourpractice today, I want you to
pay attention to just one ofthose cues I shared with you.
Watch how your patientinteractions change and, if you
want more practice, tryincorporating one cue per day
(17:57):
into your interactions and seeif you feel like your patients
become more engaged.
Thank you so much for listeningtoday.
I so appreciate you taking mewith you to do whatever you're
doing, whether that be drivingto the office, working out or
just doing things around thehouse.
I hope you have a great weekand we will talk to you next
time.
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