Dentology Podcast - Simran Bains (episode 156)

hi I'm Andy Aon and I'm Chris trevens this is dentology the business of Dentistry podcast simran's a very very impressive young young dentist we talked a lot about what qualifies your young dentist still fall into that category what's fascinating though when when you look at how long she's been in dentistry there's a lot that she's crammed into those years and and also for those a little bit of a bit of teaser uh learned about dentistry in baking yes but no she was great wasn't she I think what I liked as well is how how much she's done and and by that I mean she's worked in lots of different practices she's worked in a high NHS area she's worked privately she's built up a lot of of experience and I wonder whether some of that is almost an extension of her going to Manchester uni and that learning style that she went through at Manchester um it's a good lesson for any young dentist learn uh listening that don't just come out and want to do invisaline and composite bonding and all that stuff because there's nothing wrong with it but you miss out on some of the fine skills that you will learn mainly just through volume of transaction you know the more people you see the more you do then you'll fail faster and improve quicker and better think as as any service provider um we're service providers we're in the people business that's kind of the business you're in and I suppose the more people you can get exposed to from different sections of society it just makes you a better more rounded person better Communicator with everybody yeah you know there's a couple of really good lessons to learn that and and it was very entertaining yeah it was it was it was a good fun conversation if you are a regular listener thank you for coming back if you're new you're very welcome to join us we do put out a new episode every Monday morning at 7 am. if you could follow us and subscribe that would really help because you'll get notified when new episodes come out and if you could leave us a review as well we would love you forever and ever and ever so here we are it's podcast recording day and we have another another exciting guest exciting exciting and on a sunny day sun sun with air Sun lovely airon it's brilliant yeah we're looking forward to it a great one today actually I looking at what SIM has achieved is like whoa there's there's lots going on there's lots to get through and it's not just Dentistry so anyway let's introduce our guests so today ladies and gentlemen we have Dr simran Baines joining us uh simran is a dentist as most of our guests but not all of our guests are but simman is dentist chair of the British Academy of cosmetic dentistry young membership committee that was hard that's a mouthful and also Secretary of the College of Dentistry West Midlands Division and Avid Baker which we're going to come to at the end so welcome Simon how you doing hi thanks for having me no not at all no thank you very much indeed no I'm excited to have the conversation yeah yeah looking forward to this um before we yeah before we get into things people often say it's it's parents postcode and education are the three things that kind of set us up for for future Life we'll come to the education bit in a minute because there's obviously lots of dental education that's gone in there but in terms of parents and postcode put know together what was life like for young Simon where did you get bought up what did your parents do have you got any siblings what does that look like said that's some old daffer young sim young s what was he like when you were young back in 19 anyone who says back in 90 already lost the argument I've got a pair of shoes I think that are back in 90 I've Got a Car older than you V yeah vintage yeah thank you thank you that's what I look at it anyway sorry back to you so I was um born in wolver Hampton and and then I went away to University in Manchester so I have a younger brother he's three years younger than me and he's also a dentist oh um he went to Bristol so we're in the middle and then I have a little dog called Milo um but yeah so I think my parents probably the ones that did encourage me to get into Dentistry initially because although initially I always said that was the one career that I would never never say never because I always said I would never be a dentist and no one enough to be a dentist because I just thought the idea of looking into someone's mouth I just thought oh no I can't do that yeah not pleasant literally since then I've always said no I'm not saying never because that was one of my big Nevers um initially I wanted to be a lawyer I think that's probably more from my mom because my mom's a lawyer okay yeah she's from Singapore and then originally so a lot of my family's over there right she came here for University met my dad my dad's from Birmingham so not exotic and your dad's nothing medical or anything on that no he's um in it right okay so yeah he's good te support I think it's always interesting where it on both strains where you have kind of a long lineage of dentists through the generation so we spoke to a dentist a Spanish in Spain he a Brazilian guy Christian Coachman but he's got he's got seven generations of dentists through his through his lineage which is remarkable in itself and in some ways that almost builds pressure because you kind of have to keep it going but I also find it intriguing where you have families where there's no dentists and then suddenly there's a there's a there's a switch and you and your brother become dentists and and and that and that change as well I tell you what just maybe think about your dad really you know in reality there's not been enough time for probably Seven Generations if two generations of it yeah it's fascinating isn't it Dentistry but it you know he was probably at The Cutting thrust of it at the early doors of it I'd imagine by the S which is bizarre isn't he he's your dad he's not that old but he was probably right there at the beginning it's fascinating so much has changed since then yeah yeah and I think for young people it's hard as well because now for young people who are looking to go from school straight to dental school you need to be making this decision around whether you want to be a dentist at kind of 15 16 don't you if not earlier you need to make sure you're making the V gcsc choices to do the right A Levels to get the ucast points to get into Dental score da D so th those decisions get made early so if you're not sure something like dentry which is a fiveyear learning program that's quite a b commitment you kind of need to really know that it's for you don't you yeah I think you well I just read actually something just now to say even with with they're scrapping the personal statement on the ucast form right um so interesting yeah um so you you're not going to have to write a personal statement anymore they're splitting it up into three questions about why you want to study the course um what have you done how your you know choice is um in terms of which subjects you take influence why you want to do the course and anything else so in a way it's kind of like personal statement just get up in yeah wonder if it makes it easier for them to read and review yeah makes you more focused doesn't it instead of I tell I'll tell you what it would do because you have to answer that um personally based on experience it would probably be harder to use something like AI to produce what feels like the right answer but people do people starting to use AI to write CVS and essays and and personal statements so by asking specific questions about you and your experience Mak more think because in those cases I think people think there's always a right and a wrong answer and there isn't they're just trying to get an insight as to who you are what you've done and what you about and and phrasing it in that way might mean that you actually have to think about it from your perspective and actually create the answers as opposed to generate the answers the standard why do you want to do dadry because I can do art um you know person it probably makes it more personable which is yes nicer and just your experience of just to Insight so did you do a sort of bounce around looking at before you committed to Dentistry look at various things like I know you said you thought about being a lawyer so did you think oh I have a lawyer and maybe an accountant and maybe oh yes I probably went through everything um ini I wanted to be a lawyer and my mom's like um I don't I think you'll probably be better off since doing something more with people because if anyone that knows me I probably cry on you during an argument so I don't think i' be very good lawyer probably probably for the best and lawyer I wouldn't be very good at fighting your case oh go I just have it do whatever you want and then I thought about cting see because I I was definitely a mass person at school I couldn't wait to give up English so yeah I wouldn't be a very good lawyer because I did not like English right um and then I went through Pharmacy and eventually it was medicine dentry I think my dad always get why don't you think about dentry it's a good it's a good career especially for a woman it can be very flexible um so then that's when probably after gcse's I just have DS is when I was starting that whole journey um and then it was about year year 11 um I just thought okay between medicine and dentistry and I went on work experience at the hospital because I thought that would be a nice mix because yeah I went and joined the oral Max or facial team so I thought it's a mix between medicine and Dentistry passed out on the first day excellent so that that was great it's a good start we had someone else who did maxfax didn't they they went and did it and then that made them really realize they didn't want to do it but they they still they then but they then realized they wanted to be a dentist didn't they it was quite interesting they they sort of went straight in for it like you did ready your work experiences are somewhat interesting end of Dentistry it was yeah it was so interesting because I I saw one of it was an oral cancer case and they literally just took piece of skin from the stomach to replace the tongue and I found that so fascinating so I think that's for me is what cemented it that Dentistry is probably the way I want to go down because with medicine I felt you see people when they're ill whereas Dentistry you see people you build that relationship with someone so you don't just them when they're ill you see them at their happy times you have that Journey with them so yeah eventually I gave in I did work experience at a dentist and to be honest I never look back I absolutely love and then you packed yourself off to Manchester and we we we talked to lots of people about their their dental swad experience but I've got a very specific question for you did did dental school prepare you well to be a dentist I think in terms of so Manchester is a little bit different it's problem-based learning compared to some of the other universities is very lectures lecture based and you're you're in all the time Manchester is very different in that we only had one toour lecture a week um and the rest of it you were in in clinics so you were treating patients which I found that really helpful so rather than just learning the knowledge and learning the theory you had PB so pbl um you have basically a case which you sit in little study groups and then you go away you come up with questions and then you go away and you find the answers for yourself so you research it which I found that really helpful because then you could really research a topic and then you had more clinical time that you could then put it actually into practice rather than somebody just telling you what you should be doing so I found that helpful in terms of exams at the end I think it was so hard because you you didn't know how how much depth to go into or really did I go into enough enough depth or am I reading into this way too much or I think pbl has its pros and cons um I do I love Manchester as this city yeah but I think the school that I went to so high schoolwise was very much this is the textbook learn it memorize it and we'll we'll examine you it so I found that really tough going from a secondary school that was like that um to somewh that was pbl and you were kind of left by yourself but but but problem based learning is is a a more real world way of learning pral it well you met have people you talk to that understand the theory of things but they have no idea how to apply it or what it looks like in a real sense or people spend all their time working on Phantom heads but Phantom heads don't have emotions and don't have problems and families and everything else so when you when you put yourself into that context I can see how that's a really valuable environment toar I know how to rewire a house but I never yeah yeah and I wouldn't do no yeah that I I think pbl is good in in that way it's also for example my diploma it's a similar kind of thing where you have an essay topic and you have to go away and research it yourself and I think it keeps you probably interested more in the topic in terms of patience maybe because I think at the moment it was very difficult to get like root canal patients and you have to do certain totals dental school which that I think is very difficult to to get um purely that flow of patients and patients are happy to see Dental students oh right okay um so so what people for for Endo wouldn't want to see a student we you have to give them the option so oh okay we're happy to um which is nice because you always had that patient was like well you have to start somewhere which I think that's to start somewhere just not on me yeah just don't hurt me my first root canal ended up being on my mom so touch wood oh excellent excellent good good good yeah look at that moms don't do anything for their kids she didn't she didn't even in in the exam at the end they said oh you you two look similar and I was like oh just a coincidence brilliant that person's now having a new Crown yeah some implants and a couple of vene very young mother has a lovely set of Dentures the traffic center wasn't too far so that was the the deal is that she'll come see me and then afterwards we'll go to the traffic center very good well all the money you were saving her exactly all that money you were saving her you I know see look at that you're so generous when you you were at dental school did you do any business learning at all which I know would have most likely been elective sessions but wasn't opportunity to learn anything about the business side of Dentistry not really to be honest I don't think even the business or the accounting side of Dentistry I don't think is focused on in gal schools and that I probably learned mostly when I started my associate job so quite late on really um and that was just by finding an accountant which I didn't even know of what to start looking for and you go through recommendations and then just speaking to the accountant um and even the business idea dent I don't think anyone really prepares you for that so like going going back to dental school you know set you up for real life entry I think it's frightening is because you earn a reasonable amount of money and you can earn really good money but no one's actually taught you almost what to do with it how to keep hold of it how to spend it how to tax in all that sort of stuff no one teaches you about tax or anything like that or um until you have probably your DFT study days and you have someone to come in and it's like don't spend your first salary you're going to get and and I get it from a from a patient point of view I want the dental students to come out as good clinicians I don't really care whether they understand how to manage your own finances I want them to be good clinicians but as people within the profession um it it it disappoints me that there isn't like I on an elective basis you know be evenings or weekends or whatever there isn't access to to information that will help you and I'm not necessarily talking about the business of dentistry in terms of you know Business Development sales buying practice I'm just talking about how to manage yourself because as an associate dentist you're still self-employed so you are a business person in your own right so you have to manage your financial affairs you know you do need to pay pay tax so and you're working in most cases people are working in a small business they're working within somebody else's it's profitable that's the thing is it's so profitable that unless we when we used to do do seminars didn't we we'd say to uh guys Associates we'd say you know we know what happens as you come out and you do your FD and then you get your first year and then you sort of have starting to earn some money so you go and buy a Porsche and then you realize you got to pay tax and quite often what happened is there'd be loads of people would suddenly take their keys off their desk because they want their porches like yep everyone just the same yeah I think so that's so with BAC we we have a young genter day that runs every September and that's why we make a conscious effort to do a mixture of clinical and non-clinical talks so you put business in there that's great yeah because we think it's it's just as important and we've received I mean we had a talk from Bal from heel green right yeah yeah it was so well received because no one talks to you about the en counting side of dentistry and what you're going to be hit with and just future planning as well that's so important so if your your goal is to own a practice or you do want to buy a Porsche or just how to plan in ADV yeah so we always tend to do two clinical two nonclinical talks that's really good to hear because I think quite often CPD um it could be called clinical professional development not continuing and I think it's because dentists have this um leaning in to more clinical learning and I guess when you spent five years minimum dental school I understand it but like you say if you can open people's eyes to some of the nonclinical aspects uh it will make them better and also I think in life we you know stress and pressure comes from having to do things we don't understand so if you don't understand your finances you probably find your finances stressful yeah def because you don't understand it but it's actually broken down to bsz chunks it's not that complicated but somebody does need to explain it to definitely yeah yeah definitely just just going back to kind of the the Dentistry side when you qualified um you well until last year you were working in four practices two private and two high needs NHS practices which which I think is brilliant because quite often when people qualify they kind of just hunker down in one practice was that range of experience and a better pension seem yes and by experience I don't just mean kind of the patient but working with different teams working in different environments and the differences in patients who are at the private end and the high needs NHS did did that mean that you accelerated your Learning and Development as a result of that period can I just ask a question before you answer is was there lots of traveling involved did you you know was it like they were reasonably dist I live in wolver Hampton so two of the practices were in tord and two were in wolver Hampton um probably could walk there but I did right oh okay right sorry back to Andy's question right s too far um it definitely 100% it was I did found it I found it really valuable working in NHS um and then I think definitely like advice that I would give to younger dentists is you have you have so many that graduate denry and they just want to do invisaline and comp bonding and that's what you see on Instagram and that's the goal which is great that's the goal but I think comping it's so important to get the foundations right and I learned so when I I graduated did DCT at in oral matax um at tford hospital and then I joined my first associate role which was high needs NHS and Access Center so I think that in itself taught me time management how to think my feet really quickly come up with the treatment plan um so I learned those skills definitely from NHS um and communication skills didn't you we say to people we say we can't quite understand we worked with um Samir didn't we and we would saying you know we think and he he agrees similar to you that says you know I think you guys the young guys need to do the NHS bit because basically it teaches you so much you can then move on if you want to but the answer is it teaches you so much this week's episode is brought you in partnership with ultimate Dental business we know as guys who have supported dentists for over 25 years and through hostos in this podcast that building business skills in dentistry is vital time and again we hear from dentists who tell us that they find the business side of Dentistry the most challenging and we know that stress and pressure comes from doing things we don't feel well equipped to do that is why we are delighted to be part of ultimate Dental business the new dental business Hub delivering top tier business training for dentists founded by Dr Brad Thornton and Dr krar ultimate Dental business is a response to the lack of robust Dental business education currently available through our effective Collective discussions with d it was clear they most needed good structure and effective guidance to give them the knowledge and tools to be successful Dental business owners and to create a business that serves them rather than the business takes all their time and energy to keep going to find out more about developing your own business education click on the link in the show notes or go to Ultimate Dental business.com yeah so I've been in the NHS about five years and then only recently in December I mean I still so at the moment my week is three days private um in wolver Hampton and then two days NHS in tford and I like that mix because I think over the five years it's taught me so much and that I've refined my skills within the NHS um and then you can move over to private take more time with the patient um and then there's different treatments that you can do privately as well um I um and you know the technology you can use so you're doing 3 days private two days NHS and you're also doing a postgraduate diploma rest start in aesthetic dentistry with the College of general dentistry there's not much time for fun in there is it you're pretty busy baking it's funny because one of my one of my friends who's also doing um the PG with me she goes I can tell when you're procrastinating because I start seeing pictures of baking popup that's an interesting one isn't that that's your secret code is that what it is if you got if you got big things you should be doing you actually start baking that's a big essay if in doubt B so you're doing your PG dip where where do you see your your career going in terms of the future do are you going to specialize do you have Ambitions on the business side of the Dentistry are you are you loving associate life what do it what do it it look like I'm loving associate life so initially before I chose to a PG dip I thought I want to just home my skills just being an associate and just get my skills up to a certain level before I decide what I want to do and then I thought well I I would definitely want to do a PG dip but what in and I wasn't ready to just narrow my field into to one certain thing I still wanted to do something that hces a lot of areas so that's why I chose a restorative um diploma so it was it is really intense because there's a lot of essays but I think from coming back from the pbl background with Manchester it's really helped me because we have a lot of essays that you have a topic and you research the topic around it so it's not the PG dip with suji Dan isn't just simply just do this case and just hand a mini case in there's lots of it's evidence-based so it helped me understand okay you're taught to do something this way but why why am I doing it and I felt it was easier for me then to communicate with the patient and you're like well you know there's this way of doing it but I think maybe this way is better because of all this evidence which has helped it's fascinating when you go back to the beginning of this podcast and you're the girl you said I don't really think I'd be very good with English I didn't really like English and here you are researching and writing essays it's like hello let me just wind back 20 of minutes how how you've transitioned from that but obviously this excites you and interests you so therefore I was thinking this because I also write articles for denry magazine and I think how did I get into this when I absolutely hated yeah that's say when you listen to what you said right at the beginning and now look what you're doing I think you're right I think it's when you're interested in things you yeah you you you really want to kind of grab it and and make the most of it and kind of explain what what's going on in your head and I think if you're just writing for the sake of writing yeah I think it's like Mo things isn't it if you're not really that interested in it go through the isn't it and you don't do it your best for sure no you you you were saying about the the bacd and Al you the chair of the young membership committee and you were saying about the young dentist day how did your relationship with the BCD start because I guess you don't just turn up and say I think I'll be the chair of that committee you also had a relationship with the BCD before was that quite useful for you in the early days of your career definitely and young I started I was a student right was at Manchester so in third year I saw this advert and it was like we're looking for a student repap um you know apply so I did and then I went along to the annual conference which that I was in London so an Man actually was the president year oh wow yeah so rest your soul yeah um so I then just started going to events um and then when I graduated I joined the young membership committee right which I found really because I've always I've always wanted to help younger dentists as well and um that is a massive part of why I do all these like different gives me the motivation to all these because you're so old yourself you see the wrinkles is there a is there a date is there like an age when you can't be part of the young dentist anymore we have this conversation I say cuz I'm fascinated is it right you're too old there you're no longer a young dentist what counts as young dentist well it has to be above 30 because I'm 30 yeah I said it just suddenly made me think I wonder when you stop being a young dentist we're going to come on we're going to come on to the the wards in a minute but I think you have young dentist of the year and I think that's like 35 or something which sounds silly but actually when you kind of work backwards from when people are qualified and actually enter the profession with their GDC number and a career Ender those people kind of lots of those people aren't coming in until their mid 20s anyway so actually if you don't run it out to mid-30s there isn't that bigger window and you keep working till we see 65 70 don't we see a lot of older guys keep working maybe not as quick as they used to yeah that was a nice segue to the awards because you're on the judging panel or you were on the judging panel for the D Awards in 23 you're on the judging panel again this year which is amazing you're in the denty top 50 last year and again this year so from an awards point of view it's looking really good for siman which I'm delighted for you however Dental Awards kind of do opinion don't they you have some people who think you know it's a bit kind of backs slapping and a bit gratuitous and you have other people that really make the most of it from a from a PR point of view what's what what's been your experience and perspective on on the awards I think the dent Awards especially they do get a lot of negative press and you have people which really can go e either way and I think you have to just take it with a bit of Jess to be honest I I mean in terms of the dentry WS I I have to be honest initially I mean you heard people say oh it's you know fixed and it it depends on how many cables you buy and how much money you throw and it's really not like that from judging the awards last year you have no idea about I mean the awards are judged so far before even the tickets are released that you have no idea whether somebody bought a ticket or not you simply just there's a really strict marking criteria so it is really fair um so I think even top 50 because even I asked the question everyone asks like oh so what number did you come in in top 50 and I like I didn't ask the question but you um I speaking to somebody from fnc and they said you can't I mean somebody with like 20 30 years of experience you can't really put against somebody who's had like five six years of experience they kind of look at just your contribution to dentistry in the past year or the you it doesn't even have to be clinical because say it's different criteria isn't it yeah that are great absolutely amazing clinicians that aren't on the list so it's not totally clinical but it's probably just your contribution over the last year and just do people get snotty about it do people get a bit grumpy with you at times you know like i' be intrigued to see if you got into top 50 to people go oh and then like not your friends cuz your friends would be all right but are there other people that sometimes get a bit weird about it or not really which would I hav't I probably cry on them that's your defense your defense mechanism is it don't be nasty to me because I will cry or make you happy maybe that's it maybe if you're happy or sad you cry so therefore it's not a good one both both bases covered sorted I think majority of the people probably take it in just and they are really majority I've always said this in in Dent majority of the people I do feel are really encouraging and really helpful especially might be just be like the bacd bubble but um everyone I I say this to student reps when they apply it's not just cliche or really cheesy but everyone is so supportive and you can go to anyone and ask for help no matter what level they are which is great help which is really and I'd agree I think on the whole I think there's certain um elements that perhaps sit within perhaps Facebook groups those people can be a bit nasty but I think on the whole people are good and I think you should surround yourself with those people if you find those people who aren't just leave them to themselves you know they'll they eat themselves to death at some point and you don't we don't need those people around and I agree I think on the whole it's a very it's a very nice profession it's very very supportive do you think that um dentists on the whole make enough of the awards or being in the top 50 because I see it from a PR perspective I see as having huge value in terms of elevating your practice or elevating yourself in your patient eyes do do you think people make enough of that would you say that you've made enough of that um definitely put my certificate up and media sometimes it's but sometimes people people feel awkward with it because feels a little bit showy doesn't it but actually there is a there's there's a good PR reason to let bad I think I definitely have felt at points in my career imposter syndrome think oh I'm not good enough um like oh why didn't they ask this person well I'm not as good as this person on they this so I've definitely have felt like that in but um everyone has the practices that I'm at are amazing both of them and they've been really encouraging and which is really nice yeah have you been able to push through that that imposter syndrome is it is it has it held you back from perhaps profiling yourself to the extent you could or have the practice kind of helped you with that and kind of push pushed it Forward good question I think the the practices and my family right good because initially I would I remember um I think it was in 2017 so I was doing DCT and Seb messaged me from FMC because oh we want you to be on the cover of young dentist magazine I remember thinking like is this is this a joke like like like me I've so I've only been a year out like surely they can pick like anybody else and someone said to me like even at different points in the career if you don't push yourself out of that comfort zone you constantly you're not good enough you're never going to progress no so it is you have to say yes they like just say yes to any opportunity and you don't know which Avenue that leads to and which do that opens so even though at some points I definitely feel like you M imposter syndrome and I can't do this and like lecturing at Cardiff University recently that was really scary initially but I said yes and I thought we'll think about it when the time comes but it does push you and once you do it once you H oh actually I can do this gives you the confidence to do it do it I think also I think the the danger is if you say no guaranteed there are zero opportunities coming from that by say no whereas if you say yes okay might uncomfortable you never know where it's going to lead you never know so so that situation when Seb rang you so like to put you on the cover young you might G oh God no I couldn't possibly know that oh it'd be Dreadful please don't but you you never know as a result of that did then people see you and sudden your profile got elevated so the guys at the bacd thought actually you'd be a really useful person to run work with you you just don't know where where these things lead to and I think as a rule saying yes will bring way more dividends than saying no I think the risk with saying no as well is that at some point people stop asking you and suddenly the opportunities just dry out because you're not somebody who who kind of the sort of to people you will say yes yes exactly right exactly right exactly right um we we've we've we've sort of touched very closely to the eggs and the flour and the yeast but we've not quite got to it as a we're rising to the occasion very nicely very gooded so away from Dentistry you you love baking um before we start recording we were talking about how interesting it is that many of the dentists that we talked to over the years have a have a creative angle so we have lots of people who are musicians um shiras Khan is a is a break dancer which is a form of kind of creative um representation people do lots and lots of different things or falling over with style yes and I'm I'm interested to know that is there a link you know so for you is there kind of icing a cake and the perfect composite is there a link between kind of that artistic crossover in the perfect with the perfect comp you could do if you wanted to if you wanted to but yeah is does that does that creativity flow both ways I think it must do definitely so my mom would absolutely kill me if I don't say she helps me with baking there we go there we go we'll mention your mom in the in in the guest notes at the bottom the Sim's mom baking team but I definitely I decorate she bakes we're a team but I take it that's fine definitely I I just find it so relaxing and it's like that when when I do composite part my nerves probably agree I can probably spend ages making it perfect and we're all type personalities and you want it to be absolutely perfect so I find baking it's funny because initially when you apply to University and you have to you know show a portfolio of your manual dexterity mine was baking and yeah so I mean it was very small scale then it was probably you know cupcakes and and then when Co hit um and we were at home everyone kept saying well you keep talking to us and you're distracting us working from home so can you find something else to do then I up gardening and baking um and then yes so now I make you know cakes and I have my own little Instagram page which at one point probably had more posts than my dental one so tried to swap that around you always became the baker that did a bit of Dentistry a dentist at bit I suppose it's a big a market isn't it cakes people looking at you and you do it just purely for fun and socially or or is it is it something that you have any ambition in I I do enjoy it um well my grandma used to bake a lot then my mom used to bake a lot so I think it's always been like a a family thing it's not regenerations of Bakers yeah so I it's just purely for a bit of fun and I'll make cakes well the best is when you know I make it for family and friends and you don't have to eat it which is good but you can decorate it otherwise you'll have to wheel me everywhere probably excellent in our in our office once a month we have um we have a bake off uh it started several years ago so every month people have to kind of make something and honestly for for for for just a regular bunch of people I'm always surprised at the quality of what people turn out someone made the graveyard for Halloween didn't they yeah that's right yeah honestly it's it's F the next I'll come down yeah yeah I think it might I think it's me I think I got nominated I did the drip cake a few years ago when drip cakes order thing that was quite cool are you next up yeah I think I am wedn first Wednesday is yeah yeah I think it's when I come back from holiday so I think it's the beginning of September what you can make yeah yeah s give some hints I was going to say I have to jump on Instagram page and get some ideas and tips say you know what you're going to bake no no not yet I no idea at all no idea at all it it's one of those things it feels too far away at the moment I'll work it out in time we but no I think I'm going to go to your Instagram page crispy cakes because people always bemoan them but everyone always eats them yeah they never make them themselves that's right yeah that's what I would do because that's lazy simam we've got to the the point where we need to ask you a couple of questions and the first question we have for you is if you could be a fly on a wall in a situation not whil you're baking no no we don't want to fly on the cakes where where would you be and who would be there with you this is so hard um I think I mean I've always loved nature and animals and yeah so in my spare time I love like going on walks and I think if I wasn't probably a dentist I would love to been a vet maybe so okay I think you know one of those David Aton documentaries where I would love to I suppose there's not a wall there but just be a fly around him fly on a leaf yeah fly on a leaf and just just listen to how he because I think he's done so much for in just like wildlife and I would just love to be there just watching him record one of those CES I would find it so fascinating yeah it's a national treasure isn't it really yeah I he's 90 something is the same age as a queen or something I was going to say I think he's been been working for the BBC on that that side of things for like 70 years wow I tell you something that's quite entertaining and it's not to do with David but it's his nature have you um seen uh Benedict Cumberbatch talk about penguins if you haven't on a YouTube clip it is very very funny cuz he gets penguin wrong and then it just gets worse he like penguin andm it's quite funny it's but sorry sorry it's casual aside there but as an entertaining naturalist it's quite funny it's quite an excellent watch and our our follow-up question is uh you can have the opportunity to sit down with somebody and and meet anybody you'd like who would you take the opportunity to sit down and meet I think probably Steve Jobs because okay I find it so how he's just sorry all the Samsung users um but how Apple has just become such a massive part of everyone's life and how initially he's how he's just developed the whole how the whole idea came to play in the first place and then developed it and how it's become this huge massive company and or how he just continually push boundaries to over I mean the iPhone wasn't a massive thing when I was young younger and yeah he just pushed those boundaries and it's literally blown up into this huge massive and I think the thing that Steve Jobs um I don't know as a as a personality was a particularly friendly or warm person but in terms of what he did he he because he transformed the mobile phone market into smartphones he then took the world of music and digitized it and put it onto the iPod yeah he then had Pixar which then animated you know films to another level he he he covered off so many different things and completely revolutionized those markets and we still living through that time and the benefits of the things that he kicked off you know 40 odd years ago like you think how different the world is from even now compared to 10 years ago I mean when I was at unique Instagram was right at the beginning we didn't have Snapchat then things like especially mom when she came over here for University from Singapore yeah you didn't have mobile phones you were ringing from you know the phone box telephone boxo and now you have FaceTime and everybody's so easily accessible so quickly it's insane how that's just grow whether that's a good thing that's another conversation yeah I think you're right I think we we we're way more available and more connected I'm not sure that from a business point of view things have much quicker you know Chris and I from an era where you know you would send letters to people um and that would be the primary way of of communicating you wait for a letter by return When the facts first arrived it was like yeah that was exciting whereas now you know in theory you can get an email into somebody's inbox within within under a minute yeah but I don't think you get a response any quicker if you send a letter from 40 years ago so I think the technolog is there but I don't know whether the behaviors the underlying behaviors of hum of have materially changed mely changed if anything there's just more inputs yes but you can only work at a certain output speed yeah I think I think the big change is we've become the world's got smaller we've become so you know in in touch and so much information has become available to us that when I was a kid you know I kind of knew the people I went to school with the other kids I played football with and and the people in my my part of London that was it whereas now you can what's going happen in different parts of the world and you can get insights from different cultures and you know trying to access different Cuisines is easier than it was before so I think the world has got a lot smaller by way of kind of the communication being improved would you remember that we went to some seminar and the Blake was saying I can't remember the time frame but it might be around about now and he was saying there'll be 20 billion Internet connected devices cuz like you got connected TVs and fridges and all those sort of things it's this fun in such a short time yeah yeah well call that got us off on a wondering I was going to say we saw Steve Jobs and then that was deep it was it was good it was good quick bring some levity back into it forget to say talk about baking what's your biggest cake disaster oh you don't want to know oh no I do now now that you said I don't want to know I made these brownies and it said on I I I may have put them in the oven and they just kept rising and rising and Rising and everyone's are you sure you made these right and I was like yeah was like well how much of this did you put in and I told her how much baking powder did you put in and I put one tablespoon and she was like one tablespoon these brownies exploded in the oven it was everywhere and you can't even I mean if you try and put a tablespoon into the the baking powder container it doesn't let you so in my head I thought oh this is odd and I tipped one tablespoon out my uncle goes oh they even tried to make it idiot proof and you still got that I like your creativity the ability to think outside the problem I like that it's problem based learning see there you go look I I also like the idea that that now you've been consigned to doing the icing and your mom does the baking I think I think there's Clues the world's biggest brown there there's there's a breadcrumb trail going backwards as to where we are now Sim it's been a joy thank you for every did for your time it's been a ho thank you very much look after yourself and no doubt we'll see you at a den event at some point soon anyway definitely see you soon look thank you very much thank you for listening to this episode of dentology where we discuss the business of Dentistry if you like what you heard please do subscribe where you found this episode that would be amazing and also follow us on Instagram