YFP 336: Rx Career Forecast: Analyzing Pharmacy Job Trends w/ Alex Barker of The Happy PharmD


Alex Barker, CEO and Founder of The Happy PharmD returns to break down trends in the pharmacy job market.

Episode Summary

In this episode, we welcome back Alex Barker, PharmD, Founder and CEO of The Happy PharmD. Alex shares an update on trends in the pharmacy job market, including his outlook on the trajectory of the profession, projecting into the landscape of 2024 and beyond. He shares his thoughts on the #pharmageddon movement, with recent walkouts and efforts to unionize making headlines. He also breaks down a recent survey he posed on LinkedIn that shows the desire for more remote work opportunities and more pharmaceutical industry roles.

About Today’s Guest

Dr. Alex Barker is the CEO and Founder of The Happy Pharm D, a nationwide coaching firm guiding pharmacists to inspiring careers and more fulfilling lives. Alex is an accomplished public speaker, a published author and teacher. Since 2017, his coaching program and career development seminars have guided over 2,000 pharmacists into new jobs and roles they love. His book Indispensable: A prescription for a fulfilling pharmacy career, has motivated countless pharmacists to love pharmacy again. Alex is a husband and the proud father of two daughters. He loves drinking coffee and eating good guacamole (though not at the same time). When he isn’t working, which happens occasionally, he plays Nintendo, Dungeon & Dragons, and reads comics.

Key Points From the Episode

  • Pharmacy job market trends with Alex Barker. [0:00]
  • Pharmacist shortages and dissatisfaction. [4:32]
  • Pharmacy industry changes and the impact of walkouts. [8:49]
  • The impact of AI on the pharmacy profession. [13:20]
  • Career paths and professional identity in pharmacy. [20:01]
  • Remote work opportunities for pharmacists. [24:57]
  • Industry trends and career shifts in pharmaceuticals. [30:36]
  • Pharmacist career paths and industry perception. [35:32]
  • Pharmacy profession’s future in 10 years. [40:36]
  • Pharmacy industry trends and predictions. [46:19]
  • Pharmacy career development and job opportunities. [52:17]

Episode Highlights

But the future of pharmacy cannot be product-only related anymore. It can’t just be about medicine. Because the opportunity is just not there. So my hope is that for anyone in one of those positions, whether in hospital or in community, you’re thinking ahead and looking to the problems of the business, what they currently have. And hopefully getting super curious about how you can solve these problems.” – Alex Barker [17:11]

“I think it reflects our professional identity, we love A to Z plans, right? We want it all laid out. We want to know what is the right thing to do to be a pharmacist practicing at the height of our license. And once we have that plan, then we know that we just, we just got to stick to it. And we have been trained and programmed through our education system to I mean, just really just do that. From kindergarten to the last day of pharmacy school, we were told exactly what we needed to do. And then we get out into the real world and realize that it never operates this way.” – Alex Barker [20:38]

“And I was like, man, what, what is the message we’re sending to our pharmacists that like, you’ve got such a narrow skill, there’s nothing else that you can do with it. I mean, there’s, there’s so much – from teaching to leading to being a manager. And I mean, practically any sector, because we’re all organizationally minded. I could go on and on about the different jobs that we could do, even outside of pharmacy. But there’s so much opportunity out there. But the narrow-minded nature of looking at what you can do, I think prohibits people from seeing jobs that they could actually have a lot of fun doing.” – Alex Barker [26:07]

“But we need to influence the public much differently about who we are and what we’re capable of. Because until the public gets it, they’re not going to go along with this idea of oh, I need to schedule an appointment with a pharmacist and I need to pay a pharmacist to do something for me. When for decades, if not well over a century or two, it’s been free to talk to us. You can’t just undo that, because we now have a doctorate. It is going to take decades, if not centuries, to get people to see that we’re different.” -Alex Barker [41:06]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode

Episode Transcript

[INTRODUCTION]

Tim Ulbrich  00:00

Hey everybody, Tim Ulbrich here and thank you for listening to the YFP Podcast where each week we strive to inspire and encourage you on your path towards achieving financial freedom. This week I welcome back Alex Barker, the founder and CEO of the Happy PharmD to talk all things pharmacy job market, including his outlook for 2024 and beyond. We discussed Alex’s take on Pharmageddeon the recent walkouts and the efforts of pharmacists to unionize, the desire and shift that he seen for pharmacists wanting remote work, the transition that’s happening to pharmaceutical industry roles, and Alex’s vision for the profession of pharmacy 10 plus years into the future. Alright we got a good one for you this week. Let’s jump into my interview with Alex Barker, the founder and CEO of the Happy PharmD. 

[START OF EPISODE]

Tim Ulbrich  00:48

Alex, welcome back to the show.

Alex Barker  00:50

Thanks for having me, Tim. It’s a pleasure.

Tim Ulbrich  00:52

So you’ve been on several times. I suspect most of our listeners know who you are. But just in case, give us a quick background and who is Alex Barker? And what is the Happy PharmD.

Alex Barker  01:03

So I created the Happy PharmD in 2017 to help pharmacists get careers and jobs that they would actually enjoy. I was on that pursuit myself. I was a burned out pharmacist for a few years as a clinical pharmacist. Didn’t enjoy it all what I did spent five years trying to figure out that process of creating a job that I would love. And here I am doing it and now helping now over I want to say it’s like 2400 pharmacists that have gone through at least one of our programs, I’ve taken one of our classes. And we’ve learned a lot about what pharmacists want and what they don’t want. And I’m excited to share some of those insights with you today on the podcast.

Tim Ulbrich  01:47

So fun fact, Alex, I don’t know if we shared this on the podcast before but that was one of your early early clients. 

Alex Barker  01:53

You were!

Tim Ulbrich  01:54

This would have been way, way back when in 2016? 2017? At the time, Tim Church and I were writing the book Seven Figure Pharmacist. 

Alex Barker  02:03

Yep.

Tim Ulbrich  02:03

We were just launching the brand, the community trying to figure out what was the next step of kind of moving that from a hobby to a side hustle to a business. And that was fun, and you provided tremendous value to me, and to hear that you’ve helped over 2000 people, your team has helped over 2000 people, and many more to come. That’s legacy stuff. That’s pretty cool. So congrats to you and the team at the Happy PharmD. That’s really awesome.

Alex Barker  02:28

Thanks. Yeah, it feels good. At first, it was just about helping people and it became more about families and changing the profession. And to me, that’s what’s exciting. You know, a lot of the pharmacists that come to us are from hospital and community typically, that’s where the majority of the jobs are. And that’s where a lot of people are burned out or tired or just have low, you know, job satisfaction. And getting them into stuff that they actually enjoy frees them up, they get to be present with their families more, they get to go to the soccer game, they get to pick them up from school. I mean, you’re doing that now, right in your business, you know that there’s, there’s nothing better than enjoying your work and living the life that you want to live. So it’s a privilege that I get to do it.

Tim Ulbrich  03:20

I love I always share people’s are thinking about starting business or business ideas when you can find that intersection between a business that is solving a problem that people are willing to pay for. And it aligns with something that you’re passionate about. And it’s adding value and is adding transformation. That’s a really sweet spot said it doesn’t mean it’s gonna be easy, but it’s a sweet spot to sit in. So I’m excited. I really wanted to talk about career trends in our profession, maybe for obvious reasons. There’s a lot going on out there. And we’re gonna dabble in several different topics. But this is a topic I’ve been interested in throughout my career. I’ve done career development in previous roles, but you are the expert, your team are the experts when it comes to career development, career transitions, career trends that are happening inside of a profession. And so I wanted to pick your brain on what the heck is going on right now. What’s your take on? You know, some of the hot topics in our profession? Where do you see things going? Not only in 2024, but I’m also gonna ask you to project out a little bit further than that. And you know, where do we see things going with a lot of the disruption and the change that we have come in, but it’s I graduated 2008 And that wasn’t that long ago, but a lot has changed in a very short period of time. 

Alex Barker  03:52

Yeah, back then. It was six figures in a car. Right? That was the thing. It was just about ending around 2008.

Tim Ulbrich  04:39

Uh, it was still there. I mean, there were there was six figures and a car I would say for a couple years. Probably getting towards the end of that I remember the the line that kept going around our class. There were rumors of a million dollar contract out in Alaska for three years with one of the chains. I don’t know if that was true or not. But that was kind of there right. That was a day and age that we were in. And, and that was a day and age when it was a, Hey, don’t worry about your student loan debt, like it’ll just take care of itself. So thankfully, we’ve made some dents in that. But I want to talk about first, you know, the Pharmageddon that has been coined recently, the recent walkouts that I think everyone is realized not only internally through people that have been cheering, but that’s made national news outlets, CNN, NPR, NBC, and so forth, and some recent efforts and announcements around unionizing, which isn’t a new effort, per se, but it’s a rejuvenated one. And from the individual that does this work in and out who follows these trends, who runs your own data and looks at the workforce, what do you make of this? Is it? Is it a new era that we’re heading into? Is it a reaction to something that’s brewing for a long time? And are we actually going to see change that comes out of this? Or is it going to be more of the status quo going forward?

Alex Barker  06:03

All great questions. And I’m, I’m so glad that I get to be recorded, so I can be on the record, because then I can six months from now, I’m gonna I can look back and say where what I was wrong about. So I think you and I know that a lot of these complaints be that were sourced from the walkout. I mean, we’ve known about them for years. Every pharmacist kind of knows that a lot of the sources of a lot of our problems, where they exist, where they are, we don’t need to go into them. But they exist. And I think this was a kind of like a reaction of the straw that broke the camel’s back. Right, we just got through the pandemic. And arguably, the stress then was potentially maybe higher than it is right now. I think we’re seeing a gestalt, which is one of my favorite German words, of a problem that is so complex, and it involves multiple things. The one of the factors that I think is newer is the this new generation of pharmacists. This new generation of pharmacists is different than everyone before it, because they are actively refusing to take the majority of jobs that are being offered right now. And from big business perspectives, that’s they say that there’s a shortage of pharmacists right now. And they they attribute that to the response of like, okay, well, we’re just not able to find pharmacists to fill, like basic positions that we’ve had open for years. But the truth is, is that there are more pharmacists than what the market needs right now, just from looking at labor supply and economics. But they’re not willing to take these jobs that are out there. And we’re also seeing, and I think you’ve heard this rumor as well, that more and more pharmacy residents are just straight up quitting their residency programs. I just spoke to one last week, who just had a gut feeling this wasn’t for her, this isn’t what she wanted. And while I don’t know if ASHP is reporting that data or are talking about the residency, quit rate, everyone is acknowledging that like this is getting higher and higher.

Tim Ulbrich  08:32

So which, which in our day and age, Alex, and we’re dating ourselves a little bit, like that was a hard, you do not do that ever, or, you know, professional consequences. And so that’s an interesting, I don’t know that the data and I don’t know how that is or is not reported. But that doesn’t surprise me. 

Alex Barker  08:52

No. 

Tim Ulbrich  08:52

And it’ll be interesting to watch that trend if it continues.

Alex Barker  08:57

What I’m looking at I know that I’m heavily biased towards like generation and thinking about the next workforce that is coming in. There’s obviously a lot of work environment issues, there’s a lot of reasons why the walkouts have been influenced by the decisions that a lot of these I mean, let’s be honest, it’s it’s just the retail chains that this is being the focus of, you know, the big ones. But generationally, this new generation that’s coming into the workforce is poised to change things. Not to deviate too much on a topic that isn’t related at all to pharmacy. But anthropology has documented research to show that generations follow a pattern. And this new generation that is coming up in into entering into the workforce is the one to change things. We are going through a period of change that is similar to the time period of the Great Depression and World War Two. The greatest generation is what they were called. And they lived in a world of turmoil, of uncertainty, and things that I hope that we’re not going to repeat in today’s age. But that generation is the same generation that’s coming into the workforce. So my one of my predictions is that the health care system is not sustainable. It will change. It has to change. But how it’s going to is, I mean, totally up for debate. But the system has a lot of cracks. And I think the walkouts is just one of those symptoms, right? It’s poised for change and reform. Now, it’s going to be up to whether or not the powers that be listen, to make those changes happen.

Tim Ulbrich  11:05

I think a couple of the trends that I’m watching, and again, just the day and age that we live in, I’ve been in some meetings recently, where there’s been individuals at a fairly high level, at a chain level talking about the you know, the response to this, and what’s involved in this. And one of the “aha” is I had through those conversations is that, you know, if you think about the groups that are walking out, and who are, you know, able to have some of these momentum around the Pharmageddeon, they can mobilize quickly, or they can mobilize quickly in the messaging, they can mobilize quickly and getting the word out there. And for anyone who’s been in a management leadership role, you know, that you can’t necessarily mobilize quickly when it comes to getting press releases out, getting information out in a way that, you know, perhaps reaches people where you want it to reach and is set in a way that you want to be said without a lot of the guardrails around it. And that’s an interesting dynamic to watch right now of like, who’s really controlling the communication streams? And I think that’s gonna be an interesting one to follow. Because, you, Alex, you had a post, you had a poll on LinkedIn recently, where you asked people about the impact of the walkout, you had over 600 votes. 45% responded, that they didn’t think the walkouts were going to have any change on the industry. 40% responded, they thought eventually would change the industry. So depending on if you’re half glass full or not person, you can look at that one way or the other. But my question is, like, Where? Where does this go? Right? Because when you think about the book that always comes to mind is former presidential candidate Andrew Yang wrote a book called The War on Normal People, several years ago, and he talked about the impact or potential impact of autonomous driving on truck drivers. And I remember hearing it at the time and thinking, Wow, what a good example, and this was, you know, five, six years ago, I think I read that what a good example, for us to be thinking about pharmacy. And the picture he paints is, you know, a cohort, a workforce, largely middle aged men. For the most part, some of them may have previous degrees or training, many do not 1520 years into the career. And let’s imagine a scenario where all of a sudden, well, those jobs are replaced by technology. Now, there’s been a lot of developments since then autonomous driving, and you know, what’s, what’s the trajectory? How fast is that going to go? But it’s a really good exercise for us to think about as well in pharmacy. If we think about community retail chain pharmacy, if we fast forward 10, 15, 20 years, the pathway of automation and technology is there. Now, we may not like it or want to hear that outcome. We have state boards of pharmacies and regulatory bodies that I think are potentially going to slow that disruption. But it feels like it’s a matter of it’s going to happen. It’s just a matter of when is it 10 years, eight years, seven years, six years, three years. And so when we’re talking about 50% of the workforce, you know, the work you do and coaching people through career transitions, we potentially have a huge chunk of the workforce that we need to be thinking about redeployment into other fields. And does that come quick? Or is that more of a slow off ramp? Or am I being dramatic?

Alex Barker  14:16

What comes to mind is the entire horse industry, like in 1914, which I think is like the year before the Henry Ford model came out. And then in a matter of two years, an entire industry fell apart. There wasn’t a need for blacksmiths. There weren’t any for stables. There weren’t a need for breeders, as many veterinarians. I mean, tons of people’s lives were impacted in a matter of just a couple of years. Because we innovated on technology and we created something more consumer. Beneficial, right? The car. When I think about technology, innovating. I look back to that 1999 congressional statement talking about the shortage of pharmacists that was going to happen, which never happened. There was never a shortage of pharmacists. And there was no real indication. According to actually one book that analyzed this prediction, there was really no significant signs that indicated that that was ever going to happen. And also, they didn’t equate for the changes in technology that was going to happen in the early, you know, 20s, or 2000s. So, when I think about what’s going to happen, AI, in the huge boom that we’re going through right now, I think it’s really similar to like the dot com boom and bust that happened in the early 2000s. When I think about the core aspects of pharmacy, it’s the human element that has always been present. And for the things that are more mundane, that can be handled technology by technology, I think those will be replaced. How do we redeploy those people? I think it involves learning new skills and building new models. You know, you and I talked a little bit before this that like, what does the future look like in pharmacy, and what do I hope for. My hope is, is that we figure out who we are. My hope is, is that the associations band together instead of vie separately, and really try to create a unified, professional identity about who we are, and what we do, and elevate and showcase those pharmacists that are doing those practices and leading the way forward. Because the dispensing model is done, it’s been done for a while. And there’s really not a lot of innovation happening there. There are some really cool players in the independent space that are doing innovative things with moreso services, clinical services. But the future of pharmacy cannot be product only related anymore. It can’t just be about medicine. Because the opportunity in the states is just not there. So my hope is is that for anyone in one of those positions, whether is hospital or in community, you’re thinking ahead and looking to the problems of the business, what they currently have. And hopefully getting super curious about how you can solve these problems. You don’t have to start a business. You know, Tim and I are just entrepreneur fanatics. We love talking about it. But you can figure out problems in your current organization. And that’s really how to create an indispensable career. It’s just focus on those problems, get super curious about them, try to fix them. And that’s how, that’s how job opportunities happen. Because I mean, just one thing about AI, you know, that created a brand new industry out of thin air. Chat GPT revolutionized everyone’s access to AI, and created so many jobs. And I don’t see a whole lot of people in pharmacy going down that route. It is totally doable. It’s totally possible. In fact, that pharmacist I mentioned earlier, who quit her residency is doing just that she is now going into the AI and startup route and utilizing her pharmacy knowledge. So it’s not impossible, it can create new jobs, but it’s going to eliminate ones that the market really no longer values. 

Tim Ulbrich  18:51

Yeah, and this, you know, what you’re sharing is obviously so deeply connected to the work that we do at YFP, because for someone to have the capacity to go explore other opportunities, even if that’s on the back of them staying with their current employer. Let’s say we know the train, we know where the train’s going. But I’m gonna ride that train and kind of buy myself some time to be curious and go explore these other things. Having the financial plan and the foundation in place to allow yourself to be curious. Right, I often will say is if someone doesn’t have their financial house in order, you will suffocate curiosity. And it doesn’t have to be to your point. It doesn’t have to be a business. And actually, in the vast majority of the cases, if we’re talking about the numbers we’re talking about, we have over 330,000 pharmacists, in our profession, half of them work in the space that is tied in some way to a product, if we’re talking about any percentage of that being redeployed, it’s not going to be a big dent, that’s going to be entrepreneurship. It’s going to be what you’re talking about. It’s going to be people that are identifying opportunities, you know, within organizations that maybe are in the Department of Pharmacy, maybe they’re not and this is like any other profession any their career direct trajectory. For the most part, obviously, there’s some examples where it’s a very linear path. But for many of us that graduated, you know, I graduated at 24 with a 06 doctorate program, I was put on a one way linear path. And we get stuck thinking on that pathway. And when you talk with people that, you know, maybe they graduated with an undergraduate psychology degree or a business degree, and then they took one job, and then it took another job and another job and they skill stack over time. Right. But you can’t say draw a clean line of experiences, like we want to envision in pharmacy. And I think that’s a, that’s a scary thing to think about.

Alex Barker  20:38

I think it reflects our professional identity, we love A to Z plans, right? We want it all laid out. We want to know what is the right thing to do to be a pharmacist practicing at the height of our license. And once we have that plan, then we know that we just, we just got to stick to it. And we have been trained and programmed through our education system to I mean, just really just do that. From kindergarten to last day of pharmacy school, we were told exactly what we need to do. And then we get out into the real world and realize that it never operates this way. Maybe Only in rare circumstances or going into a major corporation, do you see the ladder before you. But in pharmacy, the ladder is really short. Most people do not go up the corporate ladder, save maybe in pharma. But it’s all just about well, get your degree, pass your boards. Go get a job. Yeah. And then that’s it. Yeah. And I think you the other aspect, you know, something you mentioned is getting into that track. I think about it’s who you’re surrounding yourself with.

Tim Ulbrich  21:52

I was just thinking the same thing. 

Alex Barker  21:54

Yeah. I was gonna ask you, you know, once you entered into the workforce, did you kind of feel like you, you came out of school, maybe like really excited, right, I finally have a job, I’m gonna get paid to do this thing. And, like, there’s excitement to both learn and practice. And then you look at everyone around you, and no one else feels that way. Everyone else is like, it’s Monday, you know? What you do this weekend? Like, there’s just no passion there. At least that was my experience. And I think if that’s who you surround yourself with, that’s who you end up becoming? Yeah.

Tim Ulbrich  22:38

And to that point it, it can become an echo chamber, you know, you talked about the short ladder, like, you know, this is true in any any part of life, we’re talking professional here, you know, this is true in your financial life and in business and your pursuit of physical wellness, and in your marriage, anything like, you know, are we being stretched and challenged? And are we being curious, right to your point, I love that word, curiosity. And if, if we’re in an echo chamber of, you know, our department, where everyone’s thinking and looking at the same short ladder, well that’s the only ladder we know? And you start to put yourself in situations where you realize, wow, like, she did something really cool. And I’m thinking about your community, Alex, and the Happy PharmD like, so and so you know, had this opportunity. And then they went here, and they did this and this and they realize it’s about the skill stack. And and I always love to give the example of my brother, because he’s such a great example of this, where you’ve got to get yourself out of the mindset of your degree, and the only thing you can do and really focus on your skills and what you can bring. He was an industrial engineer by training, he went on the fast track to investment banking, with one of the large firms, you know, was grinding that out for several years to the to the point where you know, his bonus was bigger than the salary, one of those gigs, doing huge international banking kind of got to this point of like, I see what I see. And I don’t want this to be the path that I’m on for the next, you know, 20 plus years as I raised my family walked away with no plan, moved from London to Buffalo, where we grew up, took nine months to explore, like, what were the things that he liked, didn’t like, what was he interested in? Not what was his degree or where he worked, but what could he bring to an organization? How can he tell that story? And he ended up taking a job as a president of an advanced manufacturing firm. Right? And then he eventually left that and he’s since bought a business and doing something that’s completely different. It’s about the mindset and the skills. And I suspect that a lot of the work that you do with your clients is kind of breaking out some of the shell and the habits that we form.

Alex Barker  24:43

Yeah, in fact, we we have a survey that we’ve been developing and working on, where we assess where pharmacists find the most fulfillment and what careers match that kind of fulfillment. And overwhelmingly, every pharmacist has a very high rating for anything relating to soft skills. So very few people care so much about like the actual hard skills of pharmacy. Right. So whether it’s dealing with software, programming, yeah. Providing patient assessments, like anything that you’ve learned technically probably from from school, consider it a hard skill. But where pharmacists don’t really utilize, I think, very well for career development is just all the soft skills that they build in any job that they’ve ever had. Those skills can follow you to wherever you go. I just did a, I just did a Class CE, this morning about impostor syndrome. And there was a few people on there that were saying, like I was, I was working a pharmacy job, and I quit, I had had enough. And I don’t think my skills lend themselves very well to any other kind of job. And I was like, man, what, what is the message we’re sending to our pharmacists that like, you’ve got such a narrow skill, there’s nothing else that you can do with it. I mean, there’s, there’s so much – from teaching to leading to being a manager. And I mean, practically any sector, because we’re all organizational minded. I could go on and on about the different jobs that we could do, even outside of pharmacy. But there’s so much opportunity out there. But the narrow minded nature of looking at what you can do, I think prohibits people from seeing jobs that they could actually have a lot of fun doing.

Tim Ulbrich  26:47

So as typically goes when you and I get on a conversation, I think I had 10 or 12 questions prepped. And I’m on question two, so. But I want to ask you about a trend that I’ve been following from afar, but I know you’ve been looking at closer. I saw you post on LinkedIn several times, which is a trend and a shift around remote work. He had a post recently on LinkedIn that said, you have been inspired by countless success stories of pharmacists who’ve embraced remote roles, reclaiming precious moments with family and friends exploring the world being present for all the important things in life. The perks of remote work are limitless, but it often comes at the cost of a potential pay cut. So what are you seeing in terms of both the interests, you know, what’s driving that interest around, remote work, and then the opportunities that are available in that space?

Alex Barker  27:35

So let’s start with the opportunities. Practically almost any job can be remote for pharmacists. Now, I say that with some caveats. The most common jobs right now are community and hospital. Most people have heard of remote fill pharmacists for hospitals. But what about in the community setting? Well, like it or not, there are policies being put forth in multiple state legislatures that are allowing pharmacists to remotely manage pharmacies in communities where there’s not a lot of access to pharmacies. I am not a fan of that kind of legislation. But I just pointed out as to say, bills are being passed right now to make pharmacists more available to patients via remote access. But where a lot of people are focusing their remote kind of work is in pharma. Those typically don’t rely on people coming into a physical building. So a lot of pharmacists right now are really interested in that sector. But there’s plenty of remote jobs available for just any. I mean, right? I get alerts for our clients. And I just saw a job come in for ambulatory care pharmacist remote fill. And I was like, oh, no, I’m not remote fill, but just remote job. And I was like, Yep, it’s possible care. Yeah. As far as what I’m seeing, I was actually shocked by that poll. Because, I mean, I didn’t I didn’t look at it this morning. Because I mean, it’s hot off the press. It’s still being filled out now. But I think it was like 88% of people said that they would be willing to take a pay cut to get a remote job. And I was honestly surprised by this response. But when I think about it, when I think about who pharmacists are, I mean, we’re typically remote driven people, technically. We are people that want to be present with our families. We normally have families, or they wanting to start one. This newer generation in particular, is really fascinated by location independence. They’re fans of technology, so they’re willing to adopt it in their lives. They don’t necessarily want to be in a location where there’s other people all the time. There’s definitely hinder. And there’s reasons not to pursue remote work, especially for any relationally minded people that thrive being around other people. But yeah, right now, it’s it’s kind of overwhelming. I made that post and I got a lot of messages to respond to from people saying, Okay, you talked about it, where are they? I’ve been looking for a job. And I want to I want to get one. So it’s, it’s been interesting to see, but I suppose I shouldn’t really be surprised by it.

Tim Ulbrich  30:36

Yeah, I’m glad you brought up industry, because that’s a trend that I’ve been watching as well, that makes sense that connection to remote work. I actually talked with a industry fellow recently, who is thinking about geo hacking, to, you know, technically, like there’s not supposed to work remote, but they only have to come in the office about four times a year. And usually it’s 24 hours notice, she says, like, well, for four flights a year, and I can, you know, have a Boston salary without living in Boston, right. But this is a trend I’ve been watching, you know, the data from the workforce still still shows us as a fairly small percentage of the workforce. But it feels like the dialogue around it is a lot bigger. I’ve talked for several pharmacists in the last year, you know, people that have gone from PGY1, one PGY2 to critical care, hemonk specialty roles, sometimes it was from the pandemic that burned them out, you know, others are just looking for other opportunities. And there’s a shift that’s happening to industry. 

Alex Barker  31:32

Yes.

Tim Ulbrich  31:33

 And I’m curious to hear what are you seeing the same and then to what’s driving that? Is it burnout? Is it you know, typically, industry roles come with higher compensation packages, perhaps more volatility, something we’re probably not talking enough about? But what are you seeing as some of the drivers of this shift? And is that a shift you’re seeing? 

Alex Barker  31:52

Oh, yeah, totally. Pharma is the new sexy career to pursue. I just spoke with a professor. I won’t say which school, but I spoke with them about what are students saying they want for preceptors that was like what, what kind of rotations. And she said, it’s always Pharma. That’s what they want. They don’t want clinical anymore. They don’t want community, they get disappointed when they get in a hospital. They want to see pharma jobs. And I think the truth of the matter is, is that the pharma market isn’t ready for this. There isn’t a demand there. There’s a demand on the pharmacists side, there’s a demand from our profession to get more involved, which I think hasn’t been present for the majority of our profession, when I graduated, and I think you can attest to this. We’re getting old Tim, it just hit me. When I graduated pharmacy school, the the the dogma of the time was that you were a bad guy if you went to pharma. You’re just in it for the money, you’re working for the bad guys. You need to be a pharmacist, you need to be a clinician, because then you’re you’re doing what’s right for the patient. Not what’s right for the company. Well, that is almost completely gone. I haven’t heard that from a student once or anything like it, everyone wants to get into it because of the potential for remote work, the potential for work life balance, the potential to just get away from the public. This is a newer one, that at first, I was a little bit surprised by, but for those that are burned out, it makes a lot of sense. You’re not having to deal with angry customers all the time coming at you with any sort of array of problems or anger issues that you cannot predict. It’s tiring to work with the public. And so they see the potential to work in pharma as a way of escaping I think a lot of those things. But it’s not all, you know, sunshine and rainbows in pharma. You know, there’s less job security that’s there, you’re more likely to be let go due to industry changes, market changes. You are more likely to be there, well, I shouldn’t say that with certainty. But there there’s just as many toxic work environments in pharma. There is more job satisfaction by comparison. If you just look for one for one, like job satisfaction rates between pharma and just typical pharmacy, but burnout is still present. So while I know that the opportunity is there, and frankly, like it’s so easy, from my perspective to just get started in doing side gigs in pharma that you can make some extra cash doing those things. But it’s a whole other thing to transition into the field with a job and expect remote, expect a nine to five, Monday through Friday. There are other pressures there for sure. So you have to be careful about who you I mean, what companies you want to get into. The trends are there. I don’t see it going away anytime soon. 

Tim Ulbrich  35:31

Yeah, yeah. And I’ve come to appreciate, you know, this better than I oxys you guys work in this more, but I’ve got a longitudinal appy student right now on an entrepreneurship rotation with us that’s looking at biopharmaceutical industry fellowship programs, and just hearing about all the different spaces within the pharmaceutical industry, I think, you know, in my mind, not speaking for others, tend to paint this broad brush of, you know, industry just like we do and chain and hospital and ambulatory care and academia. But really, there’s layers and details and segments, and yes, you know, MSL roles versus other, you know, regulatory roles. And so, so much to learn about, you know, it’s probably not just fit with pharma, but what is the fit with the specific areas of interest. And from a career placement standpoint, I would think that’s a really important piece to understand to then determine your path for networking and an opportunity.

Alex Barker  36:24

Right, a lot of people think Pharma is just one path. But we’ve identified I think, like eight different sectors. And within each sector, there’s like, eight to 15 different kinds of jobs that pharmacists can do. Some more popular than others. Obviously, clinical medical affairs is way more popular than things like R&D and biotech. But it’s still possible one of our coaches, went from retail chain manager to getting into biotech and helping out with operations. So like, it’s there’s endless possibilities. But it’s a totally different market. It’s not patient care, which is, like, love it or hate it, it’s our bread and butter as a profession. So it does take a leap to get into it. 

Tim Ulbrich  37:14

Yeah, and I think another side conversation that we can have, and save for another day is, you know, so much of the opportunity for our profession does stem whether we like it or not from the public and other’s perception of who we are and what we do. Yeah. And, you know, I don’t think a pub the, the lay public would necessary associate a pharmacist role with being in the industry. So that this goes back and interesting discussion, we think about, like redeployment of our workforce. You know, there’s some sub discussions in there that are really interesting to me of, well, how does that impact the public’s perception of who we are and other healthcare professionals perception of who we are, because right now, we may or may not necessarily like what the perception is, but people largely associate a pharmacist with doing one or two types of things. And we’re now starting to splice that pie chart a little bit further, which is interesting. I think it’s exciting, but also presents maybe some challenges around communicating who we are and what we do. And then how do we educate this pathway that could go in 30 different directions right now we educated to go really in one or two directions. For the most part.

Alex Barker  38:20

You know, I hear a lot of talks about this kind of thing, like within associations, mainly. Maybe a little bit in academia. But I think we have a, we don’t really understand how the market is influencing us. I think the the people in charge of pharmacy, I think for a time they thought, you know, if we just increase our level of education, people will respect us. But hindsight is 2020. And I think it revealed that the market didn’t care. The job market didn’t care. The public didn’t care about this demand. They weren’t telling the powers or regulation, or government bodies, pharmacists need more education. They need to get doctorates in order to do what they can do. And we’re still recoiling from that decision to increase our education, but the job market and the jobs available, don’t demand that higher level of education. So when I think about how we influence the public, I think we put a lot of heavy burdens on ourselves as a profession to try to maintain across the line when we aren’t even looking at the low hanging fruit. So I’ve I’ve publicly said this in a few different places. And there isn’t a whole lot of movement yet because I don’t have the time, but If I was to predict, if everything goes right Tim, and I am able to do this, I would want to create media that positively influences what pharmacists do can do. And I don’t mean cheesy patient stories or pharmacist stories about how they can save person’s life, you know, those are good. They’re good. But like, we need a Hallmark movie about a pharmacist falling in love. We need…

Tim Ulbrich  40:36

Is there a producer of Hallmark that’s listening to the show? We’ll found out.

Alex Barker  40:39

Like maybe, I hope! we need a Breaking Bad story about a pharmacist who, who has a tragic backstory to him and he goes into the pharmacy, does what he can for the community, At night, he’s like a vigilante busting of drug rings. We need video games that showcase what we can do. I don’t know what it is exactly. But we need to influence the public much differently about who we are and what we’re capable of. Because until the public gets it, they’re not going to go along with this idea of oh, I need to schedule an appointment with a pharmacist and I need to pay a pharmacist to do something for me. When for decades, if not well over a century or two, it’s been free to talk to us. You can’t just undo that, because we now have a doctorate. It is going to take decades, if not centuries, to get people to see that we’re different. We can do things we can we can change people’s lives, we can save people’s lives with what we do. But we’re not going to just make it happen if we just make the service. So that’s my Hallmark movie pitch.

Tim Ulbrich  42:09

I love it. Well, speaking of Hallmark movie pitches, maybe we’ll have it in time for the timeframe of my next question, which is 10 years from now. So your vision of our profession in 2033. And let me give you some background statistics that kind of frame where we’ve been starting in 2013 to 2023. And then I’ll ask where you think we may be in 2033. So 2013, we had a little over 60,000  – 62,000 that were enrolled in a PharmD program. The median debt load of a pharmacy graduate was $130,000. And median salary was around $116,000. In 2023, fast forward 10 years actually, some of this is 2022 data, we’re down from 62 to about 47,000 enrolled in a PharmD program. And we know that’s still going down further. Median debt load is $158,000, up from 130. And then finally, we’re seeing the average farmer salary is up from about $116k to $129k. And we know there’s some limitations with with BLS data, but we’ll use that for the sake of the conversation. And then if we draw the pie chart right now, using the workforce survey data we have from 2022. If you combine those that are working in independent pharmacy, mass merchandiser chain, etc, it’s about 50% of our profession, about a quarter, 24%,  or an inpatient/hospital/health system practice. And then the remaining 25% is a spattering of all different types, you know, managed care, fusion, academia, ambulatory care, etc. So when you think about income, when you think about enrollment, when you think about jobs, when you think about types of jobs, like where are we in 10 years? Because I think one of the questions that I think a lot about is where would things be moving with or without the guardrails of the State Boards of Pharmacy? Right, but I think you use this situation we’re in right now that led to a lot of the walkouts and things. The State Board of Pharmacy response has been largely speaking very pro pharmacist. Yeah, obviously, technology, automation for profit companies, all that, perhaps would be moving much faster if it weren’t for that. So I’m just curious where in 10 years, do you see us going as a profession?

Alex Barker  44:34

I can’t wait for 10 years when I listen to this and I go, Oh, Alex. Oh, Alex, if you only knew. So I’ll lay out my biases. I try to be more optimistic than pessimistic. I believe innovation is a great thing. But it’s not without its casualties. Um, and I have a lot of half baked theories. So a lot some of this is going to come across as like, Where’s that coming from? I think in 10 years time, it’s 2023, almost 2020, or I’m sorry, 2020 or 2034? Yeah, I think what will happen, is PBMs are going to get a lot more pressure put on them from lawmakers and the public. I don’t know if they’ll still exist by then. We are the only nation in the world, I believe that uses this model. And it’s a broken, unsustainable model. It’s already starting to get some pressure put on it from a few different places. But these organizations have a lot of money. So they’re not going to go down without kicking and screaming. It’s going to be a fight. And I think there’s going to be some major legislation and court cases to be had over the next couple of years. I think that innovation will continue to drive service delivery within the pharmacy sector. So I think that this is going to drive market demand. I speculate that there will be a new role invented by 10 years from now. I don’t think it will be a pharmacist focus role. I think it will be like a pharmacy advanced technician. I’ve already seen some, like courses and certifications and things in place for that. But I think that the tech check tech programs have been validated enough, both through I mean, we all heard about that Walgreens technician who faked being a pharmacist for 10 years. Right? Do you remember that a few years back, like 2018-2019. That was the biggest tech check tech program ever, with 10s of 1000s of prescriptions that were apparently safely approved by a technician, not a pharmacist. So I believe that there’s going to be almost like a new profession of an advanced pharmacy technician, or call it a downgraded pharmacist. Maybe a pharmacist who only needs- only needs- a bachelor’s. And because that’s what is needed in hospitals and community pharmacy. You do not need a doctorate to practice pharmacy and those settings under current market conditions, current market conditions

Tim Ulbrich  47:47

In a distribution role. 

Alex Barker  47:49

Exactly. So I think Ohio is a great example of this. I think more and more clinical services will be passed through laws and legislation that will create new jobs. However, my fear is that it’s going to be the same story as MTM. I think that we’re based on the things that I’ve read, I don’t know how confident I feel that we are negotiating for all of our worth. And we’re gonna get another bad deal like MTM. So I think that more consultancies, more service oriented pharmacy solutions will be created over the next 10 years that’ll create really interesting and doctorate level positions, to be sure. But you know, everyone, I wasn’t there when MTM was created. But I remember and I’ve read the articles that people thought this is the wave. This is what we can do. And it’s been over 25 years, I think since its implementation. 

Tim Ulbrich  48:56

2006 was the implementation.

Alex Barker  48:59

Oh, was it? Okay, yeah. 

Tim Ulbrich  49:03

I think it was implemented with Medicare. My I’m sure Rob somebody correct me. I think it was Medicare Part D in 2006. 

Alex Barker  49:09

Yeah, I got into college 2006. So I definitely wasn’t paying attention. So it’s been like 20, almost 20 years. And it’s very rare to see a business successfully implementing it. It’s viewed more as a distraction now and so my my wonder is how well are we going to be able to negotiate that into actual payment for services. And I think that innovation will continue in technology and that will replace a lot of what is happening. I optimistically, am hoping for pharmacies to be more like clinics, almost as in a like, a step down from urgent care. But like this is the first place you go to with a problem or a question. And there could be some sort of billing process that could be developed through there. And really how these things can be profitable as both through services, but then also all of the front end stuff, all of stuff that actually makes pharmacies money today, which is not prescriptions. That’s the loss leader and has been now for well over a decade. I think that’s only going to continue unless PBMs power is somehow supplanted. But for what stands in its place, you’re talking, oh, my gosh, think about the amount of time and reform is going to be in place for something like that. In to the final point, which was about students, I really don’t think that pharmacy is going to bounce back in the next five to 10 years in terms of interest. Unless something significant happens from some sort of marketing perspective. Because right now, everyone in forums and online spaces, making it really clear that the money, the salary, the six figure job, which is like the new sexy thing, I don’t know, if you pay attention to that at all, but like, you know, there’s this whole trend right now of people saying like, Oh, they don’t even want to date someone unless they make six figures. Yeah, I’m so glad I’m not dating. But people are making it really clear, like, hey, the salary is great, but it’s not worth it. The debt, the workload, the stress. And this new generation, like we talked about earlier, is just not willing to take that they’re not willing to risk it to get the money, but potentially, like hate their jobs and their lives. So I think interest is going to decrease, which in turn, of course, means increases the salary for us, increases the demand for us from companies. But with innovation, technology, I don’t know how it’s all going to balance out. Those are some of my predictions, some hopeful, some not so hopeful.

Tim Ulbrich  52:17

It’s interesting. I think there’s, as I’ve expressed you before, like, we need more of a space to have these types of conversations and bring in other types of opinions and stakeholders, you know, without, without, you know, feeling like we have to walk on eggshells, you know, and to have those conversations and, you know, you do have to make some assumptions, right. And there’s gonna be some optimistic things, and some that aren’t as optimistic. But one of the things that I’ve always thought is interesting that you alluded to in your comments there is we have a physical footprint that is very unique all across the country. Now misaligned with a business model that is sustainable, and and one that people want to be working in, right, that’s the challenge that we’re in. But we have an interesting physical footprint that was developed. And we’ve run into challenges. You know, I think the maybe the vision 5-10 years ago was a really, pharmacists can fill a gap in the need for primary care of a shortage of which that shortage is getting greater and greater, as less and less physicians want to go into primary care, and they want to go into more specialties. Unfortunately, you know that I don’t really want to say that ship has sailed, but it’s pretty darn close when you look at what PAs and NPs have done in the inroads they’ve made. But we have this physical footprint, which is a very interesting thing to be thinking about. And is it in competition with is a different than primary, you know, what are the different ways we could be thinking about this, but I do think there’s some interesting opportunities here that need a lot more thought and discussion, and you bring up several of those right there. So that’s good stuff. As people are listening, if they’re thinking about making a career transition, maybe it’s a hey, I’m ready right now maybe it’s, this is something I want to be thinking about over the for, you know, future that’s coming up. Where’s the best place, Alex, that they can go to follow you, follow your work and get plugged into the resources that you have available?

Alex Barker  54:11

I think the biggest question people have is, What can I do? Will the next place be any better than what I currently have? Yeah. Are there other career paths for me? And those are all great questions that you don’t have to figure out by yourself. I spent five years trying to figure that out. When when Tim hired me as a coach, that that was a point in my life where I still wasn’t even really solidified in, hey, do I want to go into academia? Or do I want to create a business? And that takes a lot of time and effort on your part. One of the things that can really benefit you is talking to someone who is an expert on career development, and getting a perspective that is outside of you, with someone who knows and understands pharmacy. What I would encourage you to do is to go to our website, thehappypharmd.com, I’m sure we’ll have a link in the show notes, and talk with one of our career advisors. We have two of them on staff with us, Eric and Samar. And they’ve talked with literally hundreds and hundreds of pharmacists. And really, the first step that a lot of people take is like looking at, what can I do, and deciding on a path that makes the most sense for you, and then creating the strategy to transition, and not wasting a whole lot of time doing things like applying to countless jobs, that you may or may not even like, wasting time, not having productive conversations with people. But instead, I would encourage you, talk with us, have a conversation, it’s free to do so just like talking with a pharmacist. It’s free to hang out with us. And in that, you’ll get a little bit of a clearer vision of what you can do, and some next action steps to take. And if you do want to work with a coach, we can talk to you about what that is like, what it’s like working with a coach, and how right now what we do with our clients is we work with them until they get a job. So I’m really excited about the future of pharmacy because we’re helping people get all sorts of cool and awesome jobs, like just last week, talked to someone getting an MSL role. So it’s happening, there are opportunities out there. But I think there’s a smart way of going about it. One that is faster, takes a little bit less effort on your part. That’s with us.

Tim Ulbrich  56:41

Well, great, we will link to that in the show notes happy thehappypharmd.com. I’ll also link to Alex’s LinkedIn profile. If you’re not already following him on LinkedIn, I would highly encourage it. I enjoy the insights you share on the career market that we have going on, I really look at you as an expert in the space. So I’m sure we’ll have you on once if not twice in 2024. But for now, appreciate the recap, you’ve given us where we’re at and potentially where we’re heading. So thanks so much for coming on the show.

Alex Barker  57:08

Thanks for having me, Tim.

[DISCLAIMER]

Tim Ulbrich  57:12

As we conclude this week’s podcast and important reminder that the content on this show is provided to you for informational purposes only and is not intended to provide and should not be relied on for investment or any other advice. information in the podcast and corresponding materials should not be construed as a solicitation or offer to buy or sell any investment or related financial products. We urge listeners to consult with a financial advisor with respect to any investment. Furthermore, the information contained in our archived newsletters, blog posts and podcasts is not updated and may not be accurate at the time you listen to it on the podcast. Opinions and analyses expressed herein are solely those of Your Financial Pharmacist unless otherwise noted, and constitute judgments as of the dates published. Such information may contain forward looking statements which are not intended to be guarantees of future events. Actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward looking statements. For more information, please visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/disclaimer. Thank you again for your support of the Your Financial Pharmacist Podcast. Have a great rest of your week.

[END]

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YFP 335: Pharmacy Innovators w/ Dr. Adam Martin Hosted by Dr. Corrie Sanders


In this Pharmacy Innovators episode, sponsored by First Horizon, Dr. Adam Martin joins Dr. Corrie Sanders to share keys to success and living at a high level.

Episode Summary

On this episode in our Pharmacy Innovators series hosted by Corrie Sanders, PharmD, we get a masterclass from Tony Robbins coach Adam Martin, PharmD.

You’ll want to get our your journal to write down the wisdom Adam shares.  He dives deep into the keys of success and living life at a higher level, emphasizing the importance of having fun in your journey to success. The message is clear: if you’re not having a blast, you might be doing it wrong.

Are you in the right environment? Are external influences steering you off course?

Success leaves clues, and Adam shares a powerful tip for achieving it quickly: proximity. The three-step mantra is simple—get close to people playing the game at the level you aspire to.

A must listen episode for everyone looking to become their best self and living life as it was intended!

About Today’s Guest

As a Tony Robbins Results Coach and Business Results Trainer, my focus is not only on where you want to be, but also on recognizing the value of the space you’re currently in—the space between where you used to be and where you desire to go. It is within this space that growth and transformation happen, and my role is to leverage the progress you’ve already made to propel you towards the results you truly deserve. I am dedicated to helping individuals achieve unprecedented levels of success and transformation, all while ensuring that the process is enjoyable and fulfilling.

Creator of The Fit Pharmacist, I host the weekly Script Your Confidence Podcast. As a doctorate in pharmacy having written multiple authored books, along with running my own speaking business and being certified as a personal trainer and nutrition consultant, I possess over a decade of experience working with high-level clients. I have honed my expertise in guiding clients towards their goals, overcoming limitations, and maximizing performance through a deep understanding of human behavior and performance. My coaching approach is results-focused, action-oriented, and tailored to the unique needs and aspirations of each client.

My clients come from diverse backgrounds, including entrepreneurs, healthcare professionals, executives, athletes, and individuals seeking personal growth and fulfillment. I am committed to creating a results-driven coaching environment where they can transform burdens into blessings by mastering the art of resourcefulness and overcoming past obstacles.

I utilize cutting-edge tools and strategies from Tony Robbins’ proven methodologies, combined with my insights and expertise from implementing his material in my own life. This combination facilitates powerful shifts and helps individuals unlock the next level of their potential.

My mission is to coach you to unlock your full potential, live a life of personal excellence, amplify your impact, and create a future that surpasses your wildest dreams.

Key Points From the Episode

  • Finding fulfillment in pharmacy careers through self-discovery and empowerment. [2:35]
  • Career changes, impostor syndrome, and the power of the mind. [6:22]
  • Overcoming obstacles to pursue pharmacy school and leadership roles. [9:31]
  • Adam Martin, a pharmacist and fitness enthusiast, shares his journey of using fitness to fuel his transformation and improve his studies in pharmacy school. [14:56]
  • Career development and non-traditional income sources. [21:55]
  • Overcoming obstacles to pursue pharmacy school and leadership roles. [9:31]
  • Adam Martin, a pharmacist and fitness enthusiast, shares his journey of using fitness to fuel his transformation and improve his studies in pharmacy school. [14:56]
  • Career development and non-traditional income sources. [21:55]
  • Pharmacy career, personal growth, and mindset. [23:48]
  • Cultivating a positive mindset in challenging situations. [28:59]
  • Adam Martin struggled with depression and anxiety, which led him to Tony Robbins’ work. [31:42]
  • Adam Martin emphasizes the importance of sharing one’s experiences and insights with others, even if they feel they are not good enough or have not figured everything out. [38:17]
  • Gratitude practice and its impact on mental well-being. [43:50]
  • Career growth and mindset shift from pharmacist to entrepreneur. [45:41]
  • Faith, career, and taking risks. [50:54]
  • Following God’s call to leave a job despite lack of plan or logic. [57:26]
  • Career transition from pharmacist to coach. [1:00:06]
  • Faith, career change, and pharmacy. [1:05:24]
  • Identity crisis in pharmacy profession. [1:10:51]
  • The future of pharmacy and entrepreneurship. [1:15:00]
  • Making career changes and preparing for the future. [1:19:39]
  • Adam Martin emphasizes the importance of living with integrity, serving others, and having fun in life. [1:24:36]

Episode Highlights

“Oftentimes we get stuck, we just get stopped by saying I don’t have the resources. I don’t know the right people. I don’t have the money. I don’t have enough time. The question isn’t resources. It’s how resourceful can you be? Because again, all you need is all you have, because all you have is within you now. And that’s a core belief. And if you have that belief, that will drive your actions. And when you take those actions by asking the right question, the quality of questions you ask will directly determine the quality of life that you live. Ask a better question, get a better answer.” –Adam Martin [27:15]

“And here’s the thing that I want to and I really want to drive home is that there are always both two things happening at the same time. A loss and a gain. With everything, even my mom passing away, that was a loss. And there was also a gain, someone doing you wrong, there’s a loss and there’s a gain, getting a raise, there’s a gain, and there’s a loss. You get to choose which of the two you focus on and what you focus on, you’ll feel because we’re focus goes energy flows.” – Adam Martin [28:21]

“It’s about facing it and choosing to see it as it is not worse than it is choosing to see it better than it is because that’s the role of a leader is see the vision while no one else may be able to and then make it the way you want to see it. That’s really leadership is all about making decisions in the hard times. And I’m not talking about being a leader position, per se, I’m talking about being the leader of your life. CEO of you. Because guess what, you get to choose what you focus on. Because there’s always both something gained and something lost at the same time. And what you feel comes from what you choose to focus on.” –Adam Martin [29:42]

“So when you think you’re not good enough to help people, you don’t have to have it all figured out. You just have to be 10% ahead of the person you’re looking to help and committed to constant and never ending improvement. So from that perspective, I wonder how many souls you can pour into, I wonder how many people you can bring hope to.” -Adam Martin [40:17]

“So if you’re in a job and that doesn’t mean I’m telling you to quit, but say could you be focusing on the wrong thing because you’re influenced by other people in your profession. Maybe you’re hanging out in the wrong Facebook groups. Maybe you need to listen to more YFP. Maybe we get more engaged in that community. Maybe you need to instead of listening to people who are complaining and have a life that you don’t want. Maybe you need to connect with people who are living a life through the integrity and character and lifestyle that you actually do want. Because success leaves clues.” Adam Martin [1:29:23]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode

Episode Transcript

[INTRODUCTION]

Corrie Sanders  00:01

Hi YFP community! Corrie Sanders here host of the Pharmacy Innovators segment of the YFP Podcast. Pharmacy Innovators is designed for pharmacists navigating the entrepreneurial journey. In this series, we feature pharmacy founder stories and strategies that help guide current and aspiring pharmacy entrepreneurs. Today we featured Dr. Adam Martin, known on social media as the Fit Pharmacist. Adam is a pharmacy entrepreneur that recently transitioned out of the retail space after over a decade of practice. Adam has worked with pharmacy schools and organizations across the world on leadership and branding careers since becoming the first pharmacist within the National Speakers Association in 2019. This is the same year that he was recognized as the most influential pharmacist in the profession. Dr. Martin is now a Tony Robbins results coach in 2023. And our conversation is rooted in fitness, faith and finance. He shares many inspirational life sentiments and lessons along the way. Grab a journal and please enjoy my conversation with Dr. Adam Martin.

[SPONSOR MESSAGE]

Tim Ulbrich  01:04

Does saving 20% for a down payment on a home feels like an uphill battle. It’s no secret that pharmacists have a lot of competing financial priorities, including high student loan debt, meaning that saving 20% for a down payment on a home may take years. We’ve been on a hunt for a solution for pharmacists that are ready to purchase a home loan with a lower down payment and are happy to have found that option with First Horizon. First Horizon offers a professional home loan option aka doctor or pharmacist home loan that requires a 3% downpayment for a single family home or townhome for first time homebuyers, has no PMI and offers a 30 year fixed rate mortgage on home loans up to $726,200. The pharmacist home loan is available in all states except Alaska and Hawaii, and can be used to purchase condos as well. However, rates may be higher, and a condo review has to be completed. To check out the requirements for First Horizon’s pharmacist home loan. And to start the pre approval process. Visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/home-loan. Again, that’s yourfinancialpharmacist.com/home-loan.

[EPISODE]

Corrie Sanders  02:15

All right, today we’ve got Dr. Adam Martin with us. Adam, thank you for being here with the YFP community. 

Adam Martin  02:23

Happy to be here. Thank you for the opportunity. 

Corrie Sanders  02:26

So we will start things off pretty easy. Why don’t you just introduce yourself to the audience a little bit, about where you’re from and where you went to pharmacy school.

Adam Martin  02:35

Happy to. So my name is Dr. Adam Martin. I’m known as the Fit Pharmacist. So if you’ve been on social media for the last 10 years, that’s me Mr. Memes, Mr. Positivity, encouragement, how to break through all those sorts of things. And pharmacy has been an incredibly tremendous asset. For me, it’s been a huge, huge opportunity for so many things. And I’m so so grateful for it. And my journey is a little different, because I’m one of those crazy people that actually liked retail. Yes, I worked full time for 10 years in one of those big three letter companies. And I actually had fun, I actually loved it. I mean, if you weren’t there for 10 years, you must like it at some degree, right? So. So that’s kind of where my journey started. And it actually started with rejection. And that’s really what my whole brand was about. It was about encouraging people who were not qualified or didn’t feel qualified, who had some knocks down, they weren’t really set up for success, so to say. So to really encourage them that your start doesn’t mean it’s your end, to encourage you that you may not be feeling like you’re qualified, but you have all that you need. Because all you need is within you now. That you can be resourceful and actually use what was perceived as a setback as a set up for your success. And that’s exactly what the Fit Pharmacist was all about. It was about encouraging people to use what you felt was your mess, to turn it into your message to encourage others to do the same. Because all too often what I found, and what I’ve heard a lot of my clients say is that it’s there’s a lot of imposter syndrome. There’s a lot of do I even belong here? Who am I look at everyone else I feel behind? What am I doing? Do I have a chance and using those perceptions of disqualification as the exact reasons to qualify you to make an impact in people’s lives. And that’s what I started to recognize. The more I got into pharmacy, the more I got involved with social media and a blogging career and writing books and podcasting and speaking, all of which are parts of that journey. But the whole point of that was to let you know that you define what your future is. You have the pen, you get to write the story and you get to choose because the quality of your life is really two things. Its meaning and emotion. And you get to choose, is this the beginning? Or is this the end? So that’s really what what ignited me in that path of helping people that had so much talent, so much wisdom to really tap into that, and unapologetically own their fire so that they can ignite the spirit and other people to go and do the same. And I think that’s what we’re really here to do. And that’s really what is missing from pharmacy. For those who are feeling like there’s something missing in their career, in their in their passion, or maybe they feel like they don’t have one. It’s fulfillment. They may be successful, they may be making a ton of money, they may have the position, they may have all the degrees after their name. Have y’all ever met people that have more letters after their name than in their name, you know, the ones that have more degrees than a thermometer? They have all the success, but they feel empty inside. Because there’s not fulfillment. And that’s really what it is fulfillment. If you look at the word, we are meant to fill others up. And when you’re able to do that, by being willing to be known for who you truly are, the man or woman of God you were made to be, you can do that, fearlessly. Unapologetically. And when you do that, you inspire others to do the same. And that’s really why I’ve always done what I’ve done. Now I just do it on a deeper level as a full time coach working for Tony Robbins. So long story short, here we are.

Corrie Sanders  06:30

Now, there’s so many things that you said that I think we’ll touch on throughout the duration of this conversation. I mean, I think we’ll dive into impostor syndrome, I think we’ll talk about how you defined your life as meaningful throughout different chapters of your career. So let’s start with that initial rejection. Adam, when you said your career started from rejection, what did that look like for you? And then how did that transform into what you’re doing today? 

Adam Martin  06:53

100%. So, back when I knew everything about everything, as a 13 year old, I wanted to be a vet, a veterinarian, because back in the day, I have the astute wisdom that a vet was playing with puppies and getting paid for it. Until I got the bright idea to actually work at a vet hospital and see what actually a veterinarian does. And I got what you call an education, that that’s not what it is. And there’s a lot more to it. And while it was for good reasons, veterinarians put dogs to sleep almost every day. And again, while it’s for good reasons, I just couldn’t deal with that. So it wasn’t what I thought it was. And that’s the first piece of advice that I could give anyone that’s looking for a career change is getting multiple perspectives from people actually doing what you think you want to do. Because you may have your perception, but perception is not reality, especially when you don’t have any experience there. So that was the first thing that I did was I just got experience and where I thought I wanted to go. And it was right around that time. I was coming up to graduate high school. And my mom went in for a routine colonoscopy. And she had turned 50. I remember like it was yesterday and we’re filming this on a Wednesday. Ironically, it was a Wednesday. And I remember I remember it clear as day. Kissed her goodbye, went to school. I said good luck, mom. And I stayed after school in those days. And my dad picked me up after and he was never late. But he was super late that day. And I knew something wasn’t right. I got in the car, and he said mom failed her test. Now, I didn’t know this at the time. But at the point of diagnosis, she was given less than six months to live. She was they caught stage four metastatic colorectal cancer that had spread to her liver, lymph all over, all over her body. But she didn’t. She didn’t accept that. She refused that diagnosis. And she used the power of her mind and her faith to move forward through that. And she had multiple surgeries. And long story short, that’s what led me to pharmacy. Because being on so many medications, we were in the pharmacy most days of the week. And at this point in my life, I didn’t even know what a pharmacist was. We didn’t have any neighbors, no family, friends, nothing. And all I knew being in there picking up meds from a mom is that there’s the smart person in a white coat running around like a chicken with their head cut off trying to help strangers. And the more we were there, the more I saw this compassion that they had. They didn’t know us. We were strangers to them. But they treated us like we were actually family. How’s your mom doing? If you guys can’t get to the pharmacy, you’re not that far away, we’d be happy to drop it off. And it was the perfect timing that really caught this because it was a time when I didn’t know what I was going to do because I realized that I wasn’t going to be paid playing with puppies. And it was about to graduate high school so I had to figure something out. And from that modeling of just interacting with people, that’s what I wanted to do. So I had a very strong why that kept getting deeper and again, mind you at this time, I didn’t even know what a pharmacist did. I just saw this. And I said, I want to do that. So again, to the advice of the that I started to take my own advice, because success leaves clues. So I got some experience to shadow with some pharmacists. And I just saw the interaction, the impact that they had with people. And I thought this is pretty sweet. So I decided I’m going to be a pharmacist. So I did my two years and undergrad, applied to pharmacy school, I was so pumped, I had such a strong why I actually applied to three pharmacy schools, and I got rejected by every single one. And I’ll never forget it. I was sitting on my bunk bed, in my college dorm, like I had to make a decision. Like I really like thought with myself. And I was and also my undergrad advisor at the time said pharmacy is competitive, you may want to pursue and other options, consider some alternatives. And I was getting this advice. But I also had this clear why. And I was wrestling with it. I was like the the writing on the wall, the paper, the quote, “recommendations”, or to do something else, but I have this calling. And I didn’t really understand that at the time. But I decided to go for it again. So that required some summer school. That require an eating what I call some Humble Pie, retaking some classes, really doing whatever you could to up your grades to get more involved to really say I’m committed to this. So I ended up reapplying the next year. And I didn’t get in. But what I did get was waitlisted, which means we gave our offers to everyone we really want to let in. But if they say no, we’ll give you a chance. Let’s just be real. That’s what it means. Okay, so I ended up being dead last person getting into my class, and I was not going to waste the opportunity. And that light bulb clicked for me before pharmacy school started, it was like a couple days before, they have like a two day orientation. And the last thing they said is, by the way, you have to elect the president of your class. And I remember that this was 2008-2009. I still remember that moment, a light bulb went off, because all throughout like I’m an Eagle Scout, oh did all these leadership things. And I didn’t really understand what the purpose was going to be. But in that moment, it all made sense. I was born to be a class president. I didn’t even know what that meant. But I just had this again, this calling. I couldn’t even put a finger to it. So what did I do? Success leaves clues. I modeled the mentors. So I got a mentor who was a pharmacy student two years ahead of me shout out to Jimmy Gill, to attend to the hot step. This guy was awesome. I joined an organization called SNPHA, the Student National Pharmaceutical Association, which I’m a huge fan of their platform is serving the underserved. Shout out to y’all love y’all. Well, after one of the meetings, I went up to him like, Hey, man, I heard about this class president thing. And I really want to do it. But I have no clue because you have to give this five minute talk. And I don’t know what to say. And he says, Yo, this is what you do. You get up and say you’re gonna be a liaison between faculty and students. And when people hear that, they’re gonna say, Oh, he speaks French, and then they’ll vote for you. And that’s what happened. That’s what happened. So I did not waste that opportunity. That was my first like speaking gig, right? But I was so stoked. And I took that job. So seriously, I took notes, I sent weekly emails, I treated like that it was my full time job. And it was awesome. Because from that, I gained a lot of connections. I networked because I would be meeting with professors. I literally was that liaison, don’t ask me how to spell it. But I think I can say it well. But that’s what really helped me in networking initially, was stepping into that role and saying my class is counting on me. And they may not have. I hope they read the emails. But that was the identity that I adopted. And the strongest force in the human personality is the need to stay consistent in how we define ourselves. So all throughout pharmacy school, I really enjoyed that. And I ended up going to seven pharmacy conferences while I was a student. It was incredible. I met people I got to go all over the country, Florida, State of Washington all over it was so fun. And on my rotation my last year Pharmacy school, I was doing a rotation at the FDA. And I got a call from my dean. And I was like, Oh crap, what I do? But what happened was, she said, Adam, you might not know this, but every year for the graduating class, I personally give a scholarship to one male and one female who I believe is going to innovate the profession. And it’s for $10,000. I’m like wow, what a fun fact. That’s awesome. She’s like I’m picking you. So I went from being rejected saying you’re not going to get in to now you’re the most influential pharmacist in that I think that’s going to come out of your class. And again, I said, I’m not going to waste this opportunity. So what happened was, when I got into pharmacy school, I started to find this symbiotic relationship between fitness and pharmacy. And fitness for me began when my mom got diagnosed with cancer. At the time, I was bullied up into that point, most of my life, I was scrawny little kid, I was very quiet, believe it or not, yes, it did exist. But things change, right? So there’s proof positive. But what was through that time that I used fitness to really fuel my transformation. And whenever I got into pharmacy really looking to uplevel, my studies, I found that if you partied and screwed around and didn’t sleep, well, your workouts would suffer, and so would your performance in the classroom. But if you ate well, if you slept, if you did the things you knew were good for you, your workouts would be great. And your studies would also improve. So like I said, it became a symbiotic relationship. And the point of that is once I graduated pharmacy school in 2012, was right around when Instagram was happening. And my friends were like, Dude, you got to get this. And I’m like, Well, what is it? Like? Well, you just pick a name that represents what you’re about. So I was like, Okay, well, I like fitness. I’m a pharmacist, I’ll become the Fit Pharmacist. And that’s literally how it started. Then what happened was, I just started sharing stuff, things that I liked, nutrition, things like that. And when I graduated, I thought that if you’re in health care, you need to be leading by example. You’re promoting health. So you’ve got to walk the talk. And that just made sense to me. Until I realized that it wasn’t very common. Because I started to see people over time after graduation that started getting really stressed out, gaining weight all this stuff resentful. And I was like, What is going on? You’re a genius. How come you’re on the struggle bus. And they started to share with me the things that were in their way. And I started to say, oh, try this, oh, give this a try. And it started to work. So I wondered, I wonder if other people could help benefit from these tips. So I started sharing them on Instagram. And then I started to get a website, and I started to just share these little tips. And my first business was in 2013. Being a certified nutrition consultant, helping people with nutrition. As when I was going through pharmacy school, I wanted extra. So on my off block, I decided to become a certified personal trainer, which I did I pass that exam through American College of Sports Medicine, because I was doing it anyway. So I might as well use that as an asset. Right. And that helped with that first business. And the reason I tell you this, is there was a pharmacist who was starting his entrepreneurial journey, who saw that I was growing the following back in the day, I think it was like 1000 followers. He’s like, Hey, man, I’m starting my journey. I’m looking to get some traction, you have some followers? Can you like, give me a shout out or something? And I was like, well, let’s come up with this. How about how about, since you’re into fitness too, you share your fitness journey. And because I’m a dork, we’ll we’ll call it Fit Pharmacist Friday, and we’ll publish it on Friday, or just be a short little thing about how you define fitness. And we posted it. And I got five DMS in like the first hour of people saying I want to be featured, I want to be featured. And literally from that launched a four year four year blog campaign. Every Friday for four years. Pharmacist students from all over the world, it was friggin awesome. That’s really how my brand and business began, was just creating a platform, a space for people to have a voice, to feel like they mattered. So like give them a place where they can share how they could help other people who felt like they weren’t cut out for it, how they define fitness really giving their perspective of what’s important for them. And that’s really where the social media thing began. And that again, launched into, I wrote for three pharmacy magazines through the years in the United States also in South Africa, led to writing my first book, RX You, which was all about self care for pharmacists, and students grab it on Amazon, then that led to my second book, which helped pharmacy students overcome setbacks and really dominate pharmacy school. And that then led to publishing other books as well with co authoring, and launching a podcast that I still run to this day going on six years. There’s a new episode every week, and then it led to a speaking career. I became a professional speaker through the National Speakers Association. So long story short, those are the highlights but I’ll say I say all that to say, if someone tells you can’t do something, check in with yourself. Ask why am I doing this? Because if you ask how first you’ll always get overwhelmed you will always fall into what’s called the tyranny of how frustration overwhelm, and you’re just going to be stuck. That’s the maybe the right question but asked at the wrong time. The first question you want to ask is, what do I want? And get clear on it? The second question you want to ask is, why is this important? From an emotional connection? not logical. So oh, I want to do this because it’ll create a financial security for my family. That may be true, but get an emotional why to it, because he or she, who has their why can bear almost any how, once you then have a clear outcome, and you have a clear, emotionally driven reason why, then you can ask how because you’ll be pulled towards it, rather than feeling like you’re pushing all the time. And then all of that led to a coaching career. I’ve been coaching, like I said, since 2013, with nutrition, and that morphed into mindset and psychology, of really helping people get out of their own way, and live a life that was purpose driven and fulfilled on their terms, regardless of what they’ve gone through. And I’m not just picking this crap out of books, I’ve lived this stuff. I’ve coached hundreds of people through this, now 1000s, to really create a life on their terms, all over the world. And it’s really, really fulfilling. And as we’re filming this, as I mentioned, I think you’re my 13th Call today. And I mean, I’ve been up since 330. And you can hear, and I don’t even drink coffee. So it’s just fueled by passion. It’s fueled by passion. So once you get clear on those things that are really put you in a position where you can be of service to other people, because that’s really where fulfillment comes from. fulfillment is that you’re meant to fill others up. And when you can align with your God given purpose, it positions you to co mission with God. So to carry out the purposes to do that. And that’s really what I’m all about is helping people do that, too. 

Corrie Sanders  21:55

Yeah. And Adam, that is, I mean, such an inspirational story. And it’s so amazing to see how many unique facets there have been to your career. I mean, before I even dive into the next question, I just want to say I’m so I’m so sorry to hear about your mom. But it’s such a strong testament to her faith, and to your faith, to be able to take an event like that, and really changed the trajectory of your life in a very positive manner. And to be able to give back to so many others in a meaningful way. And to use that really is fuel. So I’m so sorry to hear that. But I’m so just amazed by the outcome. And I’m just I respect you so much for how you’ve turned that into something that’s so positive in your life. I think there’s a lot of different facets that I have questions about throughout your career. And the first one is you’ve you’ve dabbled in, in sports and fitness and speaking in various different engagements. What did that look like, in parallel with your community pharmacy position? So is that something that you were doing on the side while you still held this community pharmacy job? How did you split those incomes? What did the development of these supplemental non traditional incomes look like, while you were serving in that community pharmacy role? 

Adam Martin  23:10

Beautiful questions, and thank you so much for the kind words really appreciate that. And my belief is nothing has any meaning except the meaning you choose to give it. And while she was an amazing woman, still to this day, I hear people that she was a principal of a school, and she’s been gone 19 years. And still to this day, this just happened last month, I kid you not. I was at dinner with someone. And they said we were just in Florida. And we met someone we used to work with. And we mentioned your name. And they used to work with your mom, and they went on this half hour story. This happens all the time. It’s incredible. So the memory keeps going. So I really appreciate that. Thank you. And to answer your question. So I’ve I was I started full time pharmacy in 2012. I believe it was July. And actually no, it was and here’s how I know. Back then, before corporate realized that this was a liability, what we would do – and thanks to my partner for coming up with this with this idea. The partner that shared the pharmacy with me – is the idea was if we work three full time shifts, will have a week vacation every other week. So back then we would work I think it was 8am to 10pm. And we did three of those in a row. Now. I’ll be real the first couple months was rough. But after that it was normal, you adapt. So I remember it was July because that like a couple of weeks after I started the state insurance changed to the preferred insurance that my pharmacy that I worked for at the time had it. So there were about 30 to 50 transfers a day for a brand new pharmacist at a high volume store. So I remember my first full day I worked. I went at 8am and I was there until like 100-130. So that’s how I got fast at verifying prescriptions because I didn’t want to do that again. Right. To answer your question. Yes, I did this on the side. Although it wasn’t at the pharmacy. So that’s what that schedule allowed is we would do three full days. And then I would literally have a week vacation every other week, which gave me that, that bandwidth to do that. So that’s kind of how that foundation started. And again, when you’re launching a rocket, 90% of the fuel is on takeoff. So once I got the systems in place, once I got these things down, then that really through that time, then it became easier to to grow and scale that from there. So yeah, I did the writing. I did all that sort of stuff on the side on those days that I wasn’t on the bench. And then with the fitness part, yeah, I’ve been so I’m a lifetime drug free, natural bodybuilder. I know that’s an oxymoron, a pharmacist that’s drug free, but it’s true. I do tested shows. So I’ve competed four times. And I did compete four times as working as a full time community pharmacist at a high volume store. The most scripts that we did on a Monday, when I left was 651 with one pharmacist. I’ve checked in with them since I’ve left and that’s expanded dramatically. So God bless them.

Corrie Sanders  25:59

Mm hmm. And did you have any goals in mind with okay, this is something that I want to take on my own. At some point outside of a community pharmacist, were you running those things in tandem hoping to pay off student loans? Did you have any thought as to what the end goal is? Or were you just in a state of built building and growth and development? And you were just writing that out for however long you felt comfortable? Great question. So I paid off student loans very quickly, I think it was just a few years after graduation. So that was kind of over and done with. And in terms of, you know, what does this look like? Where am I going? I love being a pharmacist, I was really good at it. 20 Because of that, that growth and the impact, 2019 they had the pharmacy awards. So 2019 I was I was honored to be named the most Influential Pharmacist nationwide. So that was that was really cool. And the reason I say that is again, if someone tells you you can’t do something, you’re not cut out for it. Tada. Right. So as soon as, as long as you have that, why, and you put in that work, and you’re consistent, and you just innovate. And that’s really what my I guess you could say my secret sauce is through this process is just being obsessed with how can we do this better? And how can I be resourceful? Oftentimes we get stuck, we just get stopped by saying I don’t have the resources. I don’t know the right people. I don’t have the money. I don’t have enough time. The question isn’t resources. It’s how resourceful can you be? Because again, all you need is all you have, because all you have is within you now. And that’s a core belief. And if you have that belief, that will drive your actions. And when you take those actions by asking the right question, the quality of questions you ask will directly determine the quality of life that you live. Ask a better question, get a better answer. What can I do to be resourceful with this? Simple questions. That’s how we make the shift. So that’s kind of what I what I did was doing that on the side. But to answer your question of, you know, what was my vision for this? I just love doing what I did. I genuinely loved it. I know that sounds crazy. Being in you know, full time community. And I have the same stuff, staffing, all the stuff that everyone talks about on the uplifting Facebook pages. I went through all that stuff. I still loved it. Because of my attitude. Yes, things were burning down all around me. And here’s the thing that I want to and I really want to drive home is that there was always both two things happening at the same time. A loss and a gain. With everything, even my mom passing away, that was a loss. And there was also a gain, someone doing you wrong, there’s a loss and there’s a gain, getting a raise, there’s a gain, and there’s a los. You get to choose which of the two you focus on and what you focus on, you’ll feel because we’re focus goes energy flows. So yes, all the things are happening. And when I say this, I don’t mean be blindly ignorant. I don’t mean be like now what do you call it blindly optimistic. The thing that I always say is, if it’s raining outside, I’m not telling you to go out with your eyes closed, and say it’s sunny, it’s sunny, it’s sunny! It’s raining, you’re wet! Get an umbrella! And while you’re out there, recognize that now you don’t have to water your gardens because it’s raining. So you just saved yourself an hour of time. You don’t have to wash your car and you just got a free car wash and that work you’ve been putting off because you had FOMO fear of missing out on the sunshine. Well guess what? Now you get to do it without FOMO there’s three wins right off the bat. So it’s not about being blindly optimistic. It’s about facing it and choosing to see it as it is not worse than it is choosing to see it better than it is because that’s the role of a leader is see the vision while no one else may be able to and then make it the way you want to see it. That’s really leadership is all about making decisions in the hard times. And I’m not talking about being a leader position, per se, I’m talking about being the leader of your life. CEO of you. Because guess what, you get to choose what you focus on. Because there’s always both something gained and something lost at the same time. And what you feel comes from what you choose to focus on.

Corrie Sanders  30:25

And Adam, that’s so well said with just your perspective on life, your perspective on problem, your perspective on challenges. And then also it sounds like how you’re receiving information, and the lens that you’re receiving information through, or maybe being in tune to the lens of others that might be giving you information and being cognizant of that information as well. So it just says a lot to your personality and your outlook on life. Do you think that that’s something that you’ve always had within you? Or did you use your pharmacy career as a platform to be able to build upon that positivity? So I guess my, my takeaway question here is the pharmacists that might feel like they’re stuck in these negative positions, or these downward spirals or a headspace that they can’t seem to tap out of – how do you advise them to come out of that hole? How do you advise them to change their mindset? Is this a question that can even be simply answered? I don’t know. But you’ve done such a good job of just cultivating your own positive mindset, any advice for our listeners that might feel like they can’t claw their way out at the moment?

Adam Martin  31:30

Beautiful question. And oftentimes, people think that they’re stuck, because there’s something wrong with them, that there’s something missing, that they’re broken, that they need fixed. There’s nothing wrong with you, you’re in conditions. And again, you get to choose. And I’m not saying this from some superior place. I’m saying this from a kid that was bullied most of his life. I’m saying this from a kid who was in an incredibly abusive relationship for two years, which led me to a very deep depression. And that’s actually what led me to Tony Robbins. So I was in a very deep dark depression in my life in 2017. And that’s actually how I got into Tony Robbin’s world. And funnily enough, I have the book right here, Awaken the Giant Within. I read this book, like my life depended on it, because it did. And in this book, it listed the power of focus that’s directed by the questions that you choose to ask. And it is a resource called the Morning Power Questions. And I was so desperate at this time in my life, no joke, I remember this, I would wake up in a state of anxiety, because because here’s what happened. I, I was, I would always wake up in the state of anxiety, to the point where it would be a like a literal panic attack, hard breathing, all this sort of stuff. So in my mind, I linked up that sleep led to anxiety. So for six months, while I was in the middle of prepping for a bodybuilding show, working full time as a pharmacist, running two businesses, I was getting three to four hours of sleep at night, because my brilliant brain came up with this distinction, that if you wake up, you’re in anxiety. So if you don’t sleep, you won’t have to worry about it. So you can imagine how fun that was. I’ll never forget it. Because in the morning, when I would wake up in that anxiety attack, it would take me about two hours to get myself together, not to feel good, to get out of the door. And those questions basically said, where focus goes, energy flows. And that’s directed by a question. So I thought, I’m going to really do this. So I didn’t just stare at the page. I said those questions out loud. What are you grateful for today? What are you happy about? And the caveat I gave is, I would have to pick an answer. And say it out loud for something that was true for me, that happened in the last 24 hours, because it forced me to look and seek and you shall find, ask and it shall be given. So when I went through these seven simple questions in 5-10 minutes, I actually felt better. It was the first time where I felt like I was picking myself up out of this hole of depression. And from reading this book, I still have the highlights the note cards from when I was in this place in my life. I thought if this guy can have this impact from a book, I’ve got to meet him. So 2018 was my comeback year. I went massive action on personal development, went to Tony Robbins conference, Unleash the Power Within. That was when Grant Cardone and one of the guys in sales, had his growth conference. 2018 10x Con, once of that, on and on and on massive action decided to become a professional speaker. And then that next year from all that work is when I became named that most Influential Pharmacist. So you’re in these situations, how are you going to use them? How are you going to use them to grow because you get to choose? Is this the end? Or is this the beginning of something that you’ve never thought possible before? So to the to your question about how do you how do you come back from this? If you’re feeling stuck? Well, what if this isn’t you being pushed down? What is what if this is your opportunity? What if this adversity is an opportunity in disguise? What if this stressing is really a blessing in disguise? What if you can take everything that you thought that you can count out, but it’s actually the exact things that you can count on. Because by going through that depression, by going through all of that crap, I now coach people to overcome it, who might feel stuck, and don’t have the courage, because oftentimes, when we don’t believe in ourselves, sometimes we have to lean on the faith of others in us until we can lean on our own faith, to move forward to continue to pursue, to actually see that maybe we can do this. And that’s really the thing. It’s questions. We have this opportunity, we’re not happy in our job. And we think and we there’s an opportunity to change or maybe go to a YFP conference, or do something like that. And we think, what if I fail, though? What if I look like a fool? What if I show up and everyone laughs at me? What if, what if I’m kidding myself? Well, what if it does work out? What if you do pull it off? What if you’re the smartest person in the room that has something to offer that you didn’t even recognize, I call this being blind to your brilliance. And I know it because I was trapped in it for a very long time. Oftentimes, we discount compliments, because we think that people are just being nice. So here’s a tip that I want to give to your listeners for how to identify something that you may have been blind to. If you hear compliments from people, it’s very easy to say, Oh, they’re just saying that because they’re my family, because they’re my colleagues and this and that. So there’s four categories of people that are in your life, you have your friends, you have your family, you have your colleagues or co workers. And then you have random people that you meet for the first time. So looking at those four groups of people, just literally take a moment. And don’t just think this, physically write it out. Because what you write you invite, and go through each group and say, what are what are compliments that I’ve heard over and over from my family? What are compliments that my friends have told me over and over? What are some some nice words of encouragement that I’ve heard from my colleagues or co-workers? And if I’m out at a party at a social event, a pharmacy conference, and I meet people for the first time, or we’re doing a podcast meeting for the first time, and we give compliments? That sound familiar, right? We can say, wait a minute, there’s a pattern here. All four groups of people who don’t know each other, said the same thing! Maybe it’s true. It’s so simple, but I can’t tell you how freeing and encouraging and enlightening this simple little exercise is to possibly reveal that everything that you’ve been looking for outside of yourself has been within you the whole time, the hero you’ve been looking for has been within. The person you’ve been waiting for you to come save you has been you, because no one is coming to save you. No one’s coming to save you. Jesus saved your soul. But you must take part in your own rescue. And when you do, you can then use that for the platform of a business of a brand of a book of a course and asking these powerful questions. What have you survived? What have you had to build a life raft for? Because if we’re being honest here, right now, you are not where you want to be. And you’re not where you used to be. And that space, you’re in between holds value for someone who is stuck, where you came from, who would die to have the insights, the wisdom, the knowledge that you now have, which leads a lot of people to say, sounds good, Adam, but I don’t have it all figured out. I don’t have my whole life that you know, I’ve got a lot to learn, and I don’t feel ethically qualified to help someone unless I’ve gone through it all. Well, here’s the reality. Look, this is Book of Life that we’re fictitiously talking about. Let’s say that your book of life has 30 chapters. And right now your quote “only” in chapter five, and you think, Oh, I’m not qualified because there’s so many chapters to go. Well, here’s the real talk. You’re on chapter five out of 30. And you’re discounting the things that you can count on, because there are people stuck in chapter one who are too terrified to even consider chapter two. But because you’re in chapter five, you’ve gone through chapter one and chapter two and chapter three and chapter four and chapter five. So you’re actually perfectly positioned because you’re close enough that the person you’re helping can relate to you and they don’t feel far removed. Because if you waited until you were chapter thirty, if you waited until you were perfect, you would actually disqualify people, because they’d see you and say, See, that guy’s perfect, I can’t resonate with him. The thing that you’re trying to make perfect is actually if you got that would disqualify you from connecting to the person that you used to be. So when you think you’re not good enough to help people, you don’t have to have it all figured out. You just have to be 10% ahead of the person you’re looking to help and committed to constant and never ending improvement. So from that perspective, I wonder how many souls you can pour into, I wonder how many people you can bring hope to. I wonder how much impact you can have from the imprint that God put on your life, not for you, but so that you can steward it and give to others, the skills, the abilities, even the trauma that you have. Those weren’t curses! Those were gifts. And they’re not for you, period, they’re for you comma, to steward and develop so that you can help others from your gifts to lead them to theirs. Because if you’re in a dark room, and a light turns on, what are you going to do? You’re going to move towards the light. And the closer you move towards the light, you can see a reflection of the light that’s been within you the whole time, the light you’ve been praying for outside of yourself, it’s been within you the whole time. Because all you have is all you need. An all you need is within you now. So perhaps the place that you’re in right now in life, perhaps you were created for such a time as this, perhaps you were perfectly positioned to help the younger version of yourself. Perhaps you were perfectly positioned to give more than you ever thought possible. Because the secret to living is giving.

Corrie Sanders  42:17

So our listeners, I want everyone to pause that and just rewind it back when you need a boost of confidence. Why you are where you are, what that looks like and what your intention is, and your purpose can be looking forward. Adam, that was so inspirational. And I think I could not have said that in a more beautiful way in terms of people taking the things in their life, whether they’re perceived as positive or negative, and how they can relate to past versions of themselves and develop them into the future person that they were meant to be. So thank you for saying that. And I want everyone to go relisten to that when you really need a boost of confidence.

Adam Martin  42:53

That’s all from the heart so that it’s just it’s all the truth. And I think that’s what resonates, because it’s it’s not made up like when you hear that are like yes, that is true. That is the truth. So what’s stopping us? The only two things that will ever stop you. And here’s another tip for your listeners, the only two things that will ever stop you is fear and anger. And the good news. The reason I’m telling you that is that the antidote to both is the same. It’s gratitude. Now, I’m not just saying pick random crap on grateful to be alive. I’m talking about real stuff. Because when you’re grateful, it’s impossible to be angry. When you’re grateful. It’s impossible to be fearful. And if those are the only two things that mess you up, and the antidote to both is the same. You can become invincible literally by living in a state of gratitude. Now, here’s the trick. It’s not just saying I’m grateful for this, you have to feel it. So I came up with this thing. Back in my time of anxiety that I mentioned. I was like, I’m sick of this. I’ve heard this gratitude stuff over and over. But it sounds like a bunch of phooey. But let me actually try it. So I woke up this morning, like years ago, and I was in my bed and I started to feel this anxiety wash over me. So it was like, Okay, everyone says gratitude. Let me actually try this. And I was like, what if I didn’t try it? What if I experienced it? This is a true story. So I was lying in bed, and I thought what can I be grateful for right now? Well, I knew that it was like cold outside. So I felt my blanket. And I just literally started physically from the spot I was in and I lit I physically felt my blanket. And I thought I’m grateful for the soft blanket. I spoke it, I felt it and I saw evidence that was real. And I was like, Oh, that is soft. I’ve always wanted this really awesome, luxurious bed. And I have it! So I thought I’m grateful for this comfy bed and I rolled around slightly and I felt it. Well, I’ve always wanted a house! And I was in my home. I’m in my dream home. Well I always wanted a master bedroom. So I looked around, and I saw that I saw that I was in this bedroom. And I felt the air on my face. I looked around and recognized I was in my dream home. And I had like, I’m so grateful to be in a quiet neighborhood. And I was just silent and listen to the silence. I call it a gratitude ripple in the now, which stands for grin, G R I N, you start with where you are, and then you ripple outwards from that place. And then it was I’m grateful for being close to an awesome city. I’m grateful for being in Austin close to work, my my family lives, I’m grateful to be in a state. I’m grateful to be in this country and outwards from there. So if you start physically where you are, it’s not just words, it’s physically connecting and experiencing the gratitude that will make you invincible, it’s impossible to be grateful and fearful. It’s impossible to be grateful and angry at the same time. So if you’re grateful first, you can’t lose, because that’s the only two things that will stop you from what you said rewinding and listening to the dose of truth, and really embracing those things. So now we know not only how to get into that, but also what will stop you. So now you’re fully equipped. And here’s one other caveat again, just to be aware of, oftentimes, when we when we talk of fear, there’s lots of different types of fear, fear of success or failure, all this stuff. Well, every human being has two fears. And I’m telling you this, because if you’re listening and you’re a human, you resonate with these. How the mind plays tricks is that you think that oh, this is just me everyone else has it figured out? No. You thought that in pharmacy school too. And you found out quick, everyone else was farther behind the you, let’s be real, right? So the two fears that every human being has, is the fear of not being enough, and the fear of not being lovable. So when you hear that, and you’re like, Oh, he’s reading my mind, it’s because we all have those fears. And when you’re grateful for how far you’ve come, that’ll help with that, if you want to and one of the real one of the slippery slopes to getting into these pits is comparison. You may have heard Comparison is the thief of joy. But it depends how you define comparison. If you compare yourself to other people, yeah. What if instead, you compared yourself to how far you’ve come? What if instead, you compared yourself to what you’ve learned? What if instead you compare it to how much resilience and persistence you’ve sculpted, since you started, that’ll have a quite a different feeling won’t it? When you give yourself that gift, because it’s true, it’s not make believe positive self talk. It’s just reality. Again, all stemming from asking a more powerful question.

Corrie Sanders  47:52

And two observations there. One I will give you credit for it sounds like throughout the duration of your pharmacy career, you were always taking action in some way, shape, or form that aligned with your why. And that is something that we hone in on a lot. I’ve mentioned this numerous times on the Innovator Series of the YFP Podcast is before you make a career transition, think about what is your why because as you alluded to earlier, there’s a million reasons and a million people that are going to tell you that you can’t do what you want to do. But if you’re aligned with your why and your personal reason, and you are strong and steadfast in your mission and your goals, that will keep you moving forward. And that is all that matters. So I want to give credit where credit is due to you too is not only being grateful and having gratitude for where you are and where you stand at each moment, but taking action in that grateful presence. And maybe it’s the gratitude that allows you to move forward as well too. But you have always been taking action so that when you’re in those mental funks, or when you’re in those lows, or how you ever we want to describe that, you have been building a repository of skills that you can fall back on or that you can lean into, to help pivot you into the next chapter. And so I want to give you credit with that and say to the pharmacists that are maybe in in these ruts, take action and take grateful action, like you’re speaking to find something that you enjoy, and start tapping into those areas of your mind or your skill set or brush those off or whatever it is. Because in order to get yourself out of those positions, you ultimately will need to pivot in some way shape or form. If you want to stay in pharmacy, it’s having that skill set and having some kind of polished skill that you can move back on to or that you can progress forward. And so Adam give you a lot of credit again for constantly developing yourself and for taking steps to move yourself forward. And then also just having that mindset of positivity and strength and reflecting on what you’re grateful for. And it sounds like you do a lot of reading and journaling and that is certainly integral to my daily routine now as well. And there’s a lot to be said for the written word, but just two observations from my perspective of not only that mindset, but taking some action behind it. So now I kind of want to flow into the next state of your career, it sounds like so you tapped into speaking, you had all of these wonderful skills that you had been building during your time as a community pharmacist. And I think I listened to it on another podcast where you said you were giving this speech and you were all of a sudden, just in this flow state? Is that when you defined yourself as an entrepreneur, is that when you started seriously, considering stepping back from that traditional pharmacist role? Can you let us into your mind a little bit about that transition from your community pharmacy career to where you are now? 

Corrie Sanders  50:46

Yeah, absolutely. And I’m really glad that you said you put in the work. Because we’re about to go with the story a lot of people get twisted. So I want to make this very clear. Faith is central to everything that I do. And this is I’m just going to start with this. How we define faith is huge. And again, I’m not putting beliefs on anybody. But what I will share with you, is that oftentimes we think that faith is like a quadrant of life. It’s a checkbox, like I went to church, I did this and that check. Faith is actually not meant to be a priority in your life. Let me say that, again, faith is not meant to be a priority in your life. Faith is meant to be central to all priorities in your life. And that’s what leads up to this next chapter. So what you said is important, again, is that you put in the work, because there’s there’s extremes, there’s all work and you know, I’m on my own faith and all this. And then there’s also God’s got it. I’m just gonna sit on the couch and just pray. Neither are correct! Faith without works is dead. One thing that I came up with over the years that I’ll just shamelessly continue to share is yes, Jesus take the wheel. But you’ve got to put your foot on the gas! You’ve got to put the gas in the tank! Let’s go! Right?  So whenever I want to my first National Speakers Association meeting, a friend of mine invited me he’s like, Hey, man, I think you’ll love this. And at that time, I didn’t know what speakers were, I thought I had no clue. So I went to this meeting. And I was blown away. I was blown away, because these were incredibly positive people that genuinely cared for people. And they had all these awesome backgrounds. And they were genuinely encouraging one another. And they were sharing stories. And you could just tell it was genuine. And I was like, wow, this is amazing. There’s no backstabbing, none of that. So I thought, this is a career? You can do this? I had no clue. But I then this is where that “blind to your brilliance” thing came in. Because I was I was talking to these speakers, and they literally would say, first time I met them, you’re a national speaker.  You’ve got a gift, blah, blah, blah. And these people weren’t recruiting me. They had nothing to gain. So I thought, why are they giving me these compliments? And then I thought, Where have I heard this before? And then I went through the tool that I just shared with you, in that moment is where I came up with that tool, true story. And I thought, wait a minute, everyone, my whole life has been saying the same thing. But I was discounting it, because I thought, oh, that’s just my professors being nice. Those are just my colleagues being nice. That’s just my family being nice. That kid at the party when I was going riffing, doing what I did with the confidence thing, he was just drunk, being nice, or whatever it was, right? And I thought all these people said the same thing. Maybe there’s a thing here. And then to what I said earlier, I started having doubts. But who am I? I’m not I don’t have training in this. So it was right around that time when I surrendered my life to Jesus Christ. And that’s where my, that’s where my faith journey really started to take off. And in that moment, when I came back, I remember clear as day I was in my apartment at the time, and I just got to my knees in prayer. And I said, God, I feel like the speaking thing is like a gift, but I have no clue what to do. And I have a job I love I don’t know. What do I do? And that was the first time I audibly heard God’s voice. And he said, Go speak. Crazy stuff. Crazy stuff. So working full time for a corporate retail pharmacy, if y’all know about the scheduling, meaning you don’t get to change your shifts, and if you want to vacation, from where I worked, you had to give a year and a half notice for a week vacation. True story. And if you wanted to shift a few days, oftentimes you had to give months notice, that was often rejected, but I digress. With that, in the at the time, NSA, National Speakers Association, offered the professional speaker certification. This was before COVID I think they’ve taken it away since. But in order to do that you had to give 15 paid talks in a 12 month period to a room of 15 or more people. So try doing that with a full time retail pharmacist schedule that you can’t move. Well, God moves. So I declare that was my one goal that year, I hired a professional speaking coach. And that was the other thing, tying money into it. It was a God situation, but long story short, this woman was brought into my life. And she ended up being one of the most influential speakers still to this day in NSA. When I was at National Convention two years ago, in Nashville, they had Hall of Fame speakers on stage showcased as keynotes and stuff. And I think there were like 12 or 15 of them. 10 of them referenced her by name in credit, and this one was brought in my life. That ain’t an accident. So this woman is brought in my life. And she’s like, Yeah, you you know, I do speaking seminars, you fly out to St. Louis, it’s two days, and it’s seven grand. Didn’t have that, like laying in my back pocket. So I thought about it. And I was like, this is when we step up. And I never, I’ll never forget, I remember recording this this video, because I do Instagram reels and stuff. On my stories just behind the scenes. I remember while going on a walk on the treadmill in the morning in St. Louis telling people, I’m here because I have a calling from God, I know I have the skill and also don’t know, I also know I don’t know what to do with it. But I’m willing to go into debt over it. And I’m not promoting debt, but I’m just saying Money talks, right? And if you really believe in something, and you know, you can make something of it. You got to be willing to put your money where your mouth is. There’s double puns right there. Right. So I did that. And I hired this professional speaker. And that whole year, things lined up, you’d like you wouldn’t believe this one month. And I ended up scheduling 20 talks, because you want to always overshoot because things happen, people cancel. And that did happen a couple times. I ended up becoming a professional in 10 months instead of 12. But but this one month, I’ll never forget, it was so busy with holidays and vacations and all this stuff. There was only one day that I had off. And I found an opportunity to speak. And it was at that day at that time. That doesn’t just happen. So God was in that whole thing. So that was that whole year fast forward. And you know, living life, blah, blah, blah -buy my house true story. Bought my house in COVID 2020. Long story there another God thing, but I’ll fast forward to this. Beginning of 2021, I hear God for the second time. You will not be in this job this time next year. Huh?  God, what’s that mean? Silence And I’m like, oh, I must have misheard, right. So because I’m in a job I love and making good money, I’m making good impact. It’s all good. And I just bought a house, right? So I’m like, Oh, it’s fine. So I just ignored it. Well, as time went on, God started to poke. And he started to poke deeper and starting to poke more frequently. And it started become very apparent that I was called to leave. It didn’t make any sense. To be honest, I was very angry with God. How could you lead me from this huge, amazing impact of being rejected to given 10s of 1000s of people hope all over the world. Now you want me to walk away, whaaat? True story. I know this sounds crazy, but it’s the truth. I went on a walk in the fall, I’m pretty sure was October. And it was raining, pouring down rain and I went in a walk because I had my breaking point like it was clear I had to make a decision. I walked in the rain yelling at the sky. It’s true. I can’t make it up. And I got back and I surrendered. I fell to my knees and said You want me to quit fine. It made no logical sense. I had no plan whatsoever. I didn’t like quit the job at the time. But mentally I surrendered and said okay, I will obey. I will obey. I’ll do this. I don’t know how or what. But I surrender my intention. Not too long after out of the blue. Oh, double pun there! You’ll hear why in a second. I get a text from a dude who I had connected with who went to my alma mater University of Pittsburgh School of Pharmacy. And he had been following my work on Facebook, Instagram with the Fit Pharmacist, and he texted me and he says, Hey, man, I don’t and long. So another caveat a couple years ago, he had a grand opening. It was actually March of 2020 when he opened his pharmacy two weeks before the lockdown. And I thought it was pretty badass for a pharmacist to open an independent pharmacy without insurance. So I went in it just so happened that was my one day of the week off it things have shifted with the work schedule since I originally mentioned. So I thought I’m off that day. I’ll go you know, wish them grand opening. Little did I know that planted a little seed. Because fast forward to this time. He said, Hey Adam, I don’t know if you know if you’re still in the area, but we’re we’re doing really well and we’re expanding. We’re looking to hire on a part time pharmacist. Do you have any recommendations? I was not intending to join at all, but I had a network of pharmacists, and I didn’t want to make some inappropriate recommendations. So I said, let’s meet up. Let me hear what you’re looking for and I’ll see if I know anyone. So we’ll meet up at Panera and he’s tell him you know, saying, well tell me about the Fit Pharmacist, what exactly do you do with like speaking and coaching and stuff? So as I’m telling him my skills with marketing and innovation and all this, he’s leaning in, and he says, I don’t know if you’re looking for a job, but your skills are exactly what we’re looking for. Can’t make this part up. I said, Well, what would that job entail? What’s What’s the job description? Never forget this. Hands me a pen, and says, you write it. Now you tell me a pharmacy job where they tell you to write your job description. What the heck is this? So now I had no intention of doing this. God’s at work. And I say, Well, I love speaking and I love coaching. I know you don’t do speaking stuff. But if I could do like 50% coaching, or I’m sorry, 50. I was in marketing, like I really love marketing, growing innovation. If I could do like 50% marketing, and tie in coaching and then do some bench work as a pharmacist. That’d be cool. Done. Huh?What pharmacists job is that?! So I ended up working part time from this guy. And again, I quit in December of 2021. After just buying a house with a pharmacist mortgage, no clue what’s coming. This is a startup company. There’s no guarantees, working part time, full faith. Full faith. Still to this day. It’s the number one LinkedIn post I’ve ever made was my last day working my 10 year career. It was crazy. And it was crazy faith. So I started this job, and it was incredible. So the reason I said it was a double punch out of the blue is it was Blueberry Pharmacy. If y’all know Kyle McCormack shout out, bro. That is a literallyis utopia, pharmacy. Anything that you can think of with retail pharmacy, that gives you a headache that you hate does not exist. They’re both on the side of the pharmacist and on the side of the patient. No insurance, over 1000 generics and the prices are wild. Like incredible. It doesn’t make any sense. It’s crazy. So I’m hired to do this. So I start that in 2022. Amazing, like phenomenal. One of the most up true story my two favorite pharmacists of all time, is Tim Ulbrich and Kyle McCormack. Their level of character is unmatched. Like I’ve never seen anything like it. And that’s withstood years of watching behind the scenes at their worst all that stuff. Strongest character I’ve ever seen in my life. Those are like I love both those guys to death. So and I would I have told Kyle like you remind me of Tim and I told Tim you remind me Kyle this is like awesome, right? Working with this. And the mission is to help people who don’t have insurance, get medications for cancer, MS. and all kinds of other things. When insurance is charging them $120 a month and we’re getting it sold them for 80 bucks, same exact thing. Same exact manufacturer, all that stuff. Crazy. So I’m joining them to do marketing. So long story short, we 5x Google reviews, I don’t know of any pharmacy that has above a three star on Google reviews, we have 128 five star Google reviews. That don’t happen, go find that somewhere! Don’t exist. There’s nothing like it. And our slogan of Blueberry was “Welcome to Different” because we did things differently. It was incredible, amazing culture. And I could go on and on about it. But that’s what led me into coaching because I was shifting with the Fit Pharmacist, I’m like, I really want to coach, I really want to get inside with people and help them break through what’s stopping them. Get through these limiting beliefs really tap into their God given potential. So they can live life on purpose for a purpose and stop settling. So I got deeper into coaching. And I had a Tony Robbins coach myself at this time. And I was wrestling, I was trying to change the business. What’s the next step? And it hit me like a lightning bolt. I’m going to all these Tony Robbins conferences, I’m using these products. I’m paying for a coach, why don’t I become a coach. And it all made sense. All of it made sense. And so I decided to apply to become a Tony Robbins results coach in the fall. And just fast forward. There’s about a 4% acceptance rate. And this is a three month interview to get in. And this isn’t like you meet with someone and a month later you have another meeting. It is literally a full time job to do this interview. And they do wild stuff like mind blowing and there’s three phases. So you’ve got to get in, you got to pass the interview. You’ve got to do all these background checks in this. You get in and there’s a phase one, if you pass and these are by the way at the top 1% of coaches in the world watching you like a hawk on and off the screen. If you pass, you’re invited to phase two, if you pass, you’re invited to phase three. And then if you pass that you’re invited for the opportunity to become a coach. So that’s what I did. And I was like, I love this. And I was doing full time coaching and part time pharmacy. But there was this calling this was there’s a lot more to this, but I’m gonna fast forward, there was this calling to become more and to be a coach. So I was talking with Kyle and he was expanding. And he’s like, Hey, man, we’re getting busier. I’m like, Yeah, it’s like the marketing is working. It’s like, it’s like we do its work. Right? And he is all the team wasn’t me. It was the team. Like, there’s Ravi, there’s Kyle. There’s all the students, like it’s a team environment. It’s incredible. Doesn’t exist anywhere else. Mind blowing, check it out. BlueberryPharmacy.com. Go there. Right? I digress. But he said, You know, I’m thinking about this, like, Well, man, I really had a great time with coaching. And I actually think that I’m called to do that full time. So he’s looking for me to transition from part time to full time. And I’m basically saying, I don’t I’m going the other way. Yeah. So it was like, well, one of the things that we always taught me as an Eagle Scout is never leave somewhere without making it better than you found it. Never leave somewhere without making it better than you found that so I thought I can’t just leave because they don’t really teach marketing in pharmacy school, right. And it’s such a strong mission. He’s such a great guy, I can’t just leave. So I was like, I need to find a replacement. And thank God, there was a pharmacy student on rotation, phenomenal guy, entrepreneurial spirit. And he was looking to actually sign on with Rite Aid. And both Kyle and I were like, nah, nah, don’t do that. So we’re talking to him. We’re just being honest. Like, you know, tell us what your goals are really understanding, getting to know what he’s about. And so we talked with him, like, Hey, man, I actually would like you to take over like, you’ve got the skills, let me train you all this stuff. So we ended up making the decision. Again, it’s you’re coming out of school going all in on a startup, still, it’s a risky move, but he did it. I tell that point of the story. Because he had a mentor, he had Kyle as his mentor, he had us to support him. And he made that move. He already signed with Rite Aid before he graduated, and then he ended up changing. So I’m going to Blueberry appreciate the opportunity. All this. A month later, Rite Aid goes bankrupt. How about that? How about that? God continues! Right? No, I ended up working my last shift of August of 2023. And I was full time I think it was in May. So now I’m working with 93 clients all over the country. I also am a business results trainer, helping businesses from, hey, I have an idea. I don’t know what to do to hey, we’re making 100 million, we want to turn it into 200 million next year. So I not only train the owner, I also get to train their team. And what training is, is it’s combining coaching and speaking. It’s my playground, it’s awesome. I’m able to have all the So long story short, God guided me through this. God directed me he called me to walk away from a career, everything that I shared. Adam, it’s time to walk away. It’s time to change your identity. Because your identity isn’t linked to a role. It isn’t linked to a job. It’s who you are in Jesus, it’s who you are in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Apart from me, you can do nothing. So that was a real coming to Jesus moment, and laying down everything that I thought I had built. But it was really him the whole time. And really surrendering to that and talk about a faith leap. And here’s the thing that we’re understanding ends is where faith begins. Because that move made no logical sense to anybody. True story. When I posted I’m leaving pharmacy, I had my professors text me to make sure I was okay. I had a professor who’s now a Dean at a Pharmacy reached out to me. And if you’re listening to this, I love you, man. Thank you. Make sure I was okay. Because it made no logical sense. But God does. And then to your point, you did all this work? Yes, faith and work is required. It is a co partnership. And that’s really my mission is life. My mission in life is to comission with Jesus to reconcile relationships and redeem people’s lives. That’s it. That’s why I do what I do. And it’s so incredibly fulfilling. And it’s a blast. We have fun. And when I tell my clients, I say you’re here to get results and you’re guaranteed results every session because we’re not called coaches, you get a result in 30 Minutes or Less guaranteed, and you will get a result and you’re going to have fun because if you’re not having fun, you’re doing it wrong. So if you don’t like to have fun, we got to get you a new coach. So that’s the first call I have with my clients. And if they’re not laughing I know it’s time to go! So it’s fun. It’s a blast. People are changing their lives and being able to witness that being able to be a vessel for God to do that work. It’s absolutely extraordinary and, and the level of faith that this has grown, I’ve gotten to see people bring their lives to Jesus through this, I’ve gotten to see people turn the impossible in the into the possible, which is really what a breakthrough is. A breakthrough is a moment in time when the impossible becomes possible. And you actually are living that, and seeing someone do that the look in their eyes, the moment where they think this can happen, this is possible. That’s why do this all so that people ignite their light within. And when you unapologetically own your fire, you get to spark someone else’s light. And then they can go and do it too. And that’s why I do what I do to keep that moving through.

Corrie Sanders1:10:51

I think it’s beautiful to hear that you didn’t necessarily have an identity crisis. And that’s something that I think about all the time because I am similar to you, Adam, I mean, just about as involved in pharmacy as I can be in the state of Hawaii, and I love being a pharmacist.

Adam Martin  1:11:08

In Hawaii! 

Corrie Sanders  1:11:10

Specifically.

Adam Martin  1:11:12

People probably want to switch with you!

Corrie Sanders  1:11:15

But I also think about all the time, I mean, I’ve been very I’ve taken a lot of risks in the past year. And I’m like, if worse comes to worse, my identity is not tied to this profession as much as I love it. And I love being a part of it. And I think there’s so much that we can do, and there’s a lot of untapped potential in pharmacy. If the world were to collapse on pharmacy, tomorrow, I’m going to be fine, I would figure it out, it’s going to be okay. So I think that that’s always an interesting lens as a pharmacy entrepreneur is are you tied to being a pharmacist, because that almost can become a self limiting belief with potential that you can have on the healthcare community in general, not just the pharmacy community. And I think when you’re on this path of impact and growth, and you’re finding your flow state, the opportunities that present themselves to you are beyond what you could have comprehended and a lot of times they reach into healthcare in general, not just this unique, narrow pharmacy lens, which is obviously something that nobody teaches you in pharmacy school, and that you don’t learn without experience. But I do think about that identity crisis all the time on my own path. So I just wanted to articulate that and to point that out, and to give that to other pharmacy entrepreneurs or to other pharmacists that, you know, don’t ever define yourself as a person to your career, I think that is just such a huge, it’s just a It hurts my character to think about that.

Adam Martin  1:12:41

Brilliant point. And I’m really glad that you highlighted that. And first, I want to acknowledge you because you said you’re taking lots of risks. No risk, no reward. Now, to your point about people tying their identity to pharmacists, this is a very, it’s a nuance, but it’s very important. How you identify how you label, the word pharmacist, how you define that can totally change your life. When you change the way you label things, the things you label change. And what I mean by that is, how do you define pharmacist? Most people in retail, the identity pharmacist is that you’re working full time at one location. So if you were to change, you are threatening your identity. And again, the strongest force in the human personality is the need to stay consistent and how we define ourselves. So if your definition of being a pharmacist is staying full time at a retail establishment, and you have an opportunity to go do a residency, go do a fellowship, go do whatever that threatens your definition of your identity. And you might not understand why you may chalk it up to fear. But really what it is, is you’re protecting your identity because of how you choose to define pharmacists. And most often that wasn’t consciously chosen that was subconsciously adapted or borrowed from someone else. So really think if you are stuck, if you’re thinking of oh, I might want to change or explore other options are go the entrepreneur route, and you and you thought about it. But if you’re honest with yourself, are you still stuck where you’ve been? Or you maybe complacent. And this isn’t coming at you, I’m actually coming with you. If you’re not making any progress, just pause and say, how do I define myself? If I define myself as a pharmacist, critical care, ambulatory care, whatever it is, what’s that mean to me? Because nothing has any meaning except the meaning you choose to give it and when you give it an identity, you protect that to the death, including your passion and fulfillment. So if you’re feeling burned out, maybe it’s not that you’re overworked. Maybe it’s that you’re underwhelmed. 

Corrie Sanders  1:15:00

And to kind of plug a line in the same vein there, too. I know we spoke earlier about the mindset of people in pharmacy right now. I mean, I don’t think it’s a secret. There’s all these positive I’m I’ve got air quotes on for the listeners, these “positive” Facebook communities or we’re seeing a lot on LinkedIn and across the news with Pharmageddon. And these pharmacy walkouts, and a lot happening with pharmacists not necessarily even asking for higher pay, but just asking for safer working conditions. I would love to ask for your insight on the future of pharmacy because you’ve got this lens of having been in a traditional three letter pharmacy setting having been in a very non traditional Blueberry Pharmacy setting where you’re doing something totally different. And now being a pharmacy entrepreneur, where you’re coaching people in both of these settings, and you kind of have your hands in a lot of different pharmacy baskets, so to speak, or you’re able to see pharmacy through a very, very unique lens that I think only comes with experience. So to pharmacists that are potentially in those retail settings,  any advice on what the future of pharmacy looks like, advice for them in general, I will leave the floor open to you with anything that you want to add just based off the current current climate of pharmacy in November of 2023.

Corrie Sanders  1:16:06

Really good question, and I’m going to steal something from my dear friend Joseph McClendon, the third, who says the future is what you dare to make of it and Fortune favors the bold.

Corrie Sanders  1:16:41

I love it a short and sweet and simple answer. We don’t need to dive into the weeds.

Adam Martin  1:16:48

But It’s the truth. Nothing has any meaning except the meaning you choose to give it we can look at all the things that are wrong. And we can also say, is this terrible? Or is this actually an opportunity in disguise, because of injustice goes on for so long,  eventually it’s going to pop and that’s an excellent opportunity to innovate. Let’s let’s use an example. I like this one. The music industry. Y’all remember the 90s when CDs had like 12 songs, and they were like $20. That was such a rip off. It was screwing people! And what happened? Napster. Online music. The industry was destroyed because of their greed. And history tends to repeat itself.

Corrie Sanders  1:17:34

Very well said and a lot of food for thought and very many different ways that you can take that. So I love it will leave our listeners with a little tease and a little bit of introspection with their own beliefs and where they see where they see pharmacies going. But I do really appreciate that comment, Adam. 

Corrie Sanders  1:17:52

So I will kind of round things out here with three questions that I just like to throw on at the end of our podcast, just very brief, meant to be a little bit of a personal testament to your journey, and hopefully bring some inspiration to some of our listeners. So what has been the most memorable aspect of being a pharmacy entrepreneur, any moment that sticks out in your head?

Adam Martin  1:17:52

Absolutely. 

Adam Martin  1:18:18

I think it’s really taking the leap and not looking back. And there’s something that is really cool. When next time you’re driving, if you’re thinking of making the leap, if you’ve had the courage, and like I’m gonna do it, I’m gonna do it. I, I want to Tim’s thing, and I’m in this community and I’m fired up and you go and you hold back, and you pump the brakes. And you’re in this cycle of getting pumped up, but not actually moving forward. Well, the next time you’re in your car, just take a look. Because again, it’s all about being resourceful, and success leaves clues. So if you look forward, you’ll see that the windshield is quite expansive, and it’s looking forward. But you also see your rearview mirror. That’s quite tiny, looking back. Which would you like to focus on?Which way are you going? Don’t look back, you’re not going that way.

Corrie Sanders  1:19:17

For a second, I thought you were gonna say “close your eyes.” And I was like…..next time you’re driving close your eyes! Very well said. Puts puts perspective into true form. So Adam, a piece of advice for someone contemplating a non traditional pharmacy career path? 

Adam Martin  1:19:37

Absolutely. Why do you want to do it? And here’s this is actually a really good question. And something that I see a lot of people doing when they do it and they have regrets, or they get angry or resentful is are you moving towards something? Or are you moving away from it? Oftentimes people make changes preemptively off of emotion and when you make an emotion out of fear or anger, it’s almost always the wrong decision. So looking at human behavior and test me on this, don’t just listen, test me. The only two reasons that humans make any action is to avoid pain and to seek pleasure. Now of the two just asking you, which one do you think is a stronger driving force initially avoiding pain, or seeking pleasure? 

Corrie Sanders  1:20:30

Initially avoiding pain.

Adam Martin  1:20:31

100%. Spot on. So what most people do when they’re making career change, is they’re like, Oh, we’re understaffed and underpaid. This is terrible. So they jump out of the pan and into the fire. So initially, it is very helpful to get leverage on yourself. Because without leverage, nothing lasts. And in order to make that change last long term, you need a also pleasurable future, a compelling future that has emotionally compelling reasons why. So yes, you want to be real with the pain? Why do you want to leave? But you also want a clear, compelling future with emotionally driven reasons why? That’s how you’ll make it to last. So just ask yourself, why do you want to leave? Most people say because it sucks here. It’s another day in hell, whatever. Okay? That’s real. Well, what’s the other alternative? Because make sure that you’re not jumping out of the frying pan into the fire. So be really clear on why you’re looking to make a change and be responsible. If you’re married. If you have kids, and it’s a huge risk, make sure you’ve got money in the bank, make sure you have a contingency plan. And this is something that I train people when they’re starting a brand. And we’re going to scale it down to scale it up. So when you’re when you’re gonna make a brand, and you’re going to get on social media, create content, podcasts, episodes, whatever. Well, right now, when you’re ready to launch, we’re super pumped up, just like when you’re ready to change jobs, you’re super pumped up to do whatever it takes. And you might commit some posting every day, twice a day. Well, what about when you’re not pumped up? What about when you’ve had a really rough day? What about when you lose your best friend. So what I recommend is future pace yourself. So imagine and use the future, use the past. So you’ve already had troubling experiences, it’s already happened. Use those to your advantage. Think back to a time when you were in a rough spot in your life. And so this is the personal brand context of making content. Think back to a time when you were having a really rough spot? How if you were in that spot back then how much energy and mental effort would you be able to commit to posting? So how many posts a week would you make if you were in the toughest spot in your life, and most people say, like once a week, so use that as your baseline, and until you’re consistent for three to six months, then scale up, it’s all about consistency. That’s the key. And as a fitness person, consistency is the best workout. Consistent, and we all want to make these intense changes post 10 times a day, change my job, burn the boats, well, we want to be intense, but we don’t want to be consistent. And consistency is the most intense thing you can do. Because hardly anyone does that craziness. So the thing that is telling you this is prepare. So if you’re looking to make the change, recognize that you’re likely in a very heightened emotional state. So future paced by looking at when you were rough, what was the most stressful financial time that you had in your past? What did you what was what was in jeopardy? Was it your rent? Was it your mortgage? Was it your children’s medical bills, and then use that knowledge because history tends to repeat itself. So use that knowledge to prepare for the storms that not may but will come in the future. So consider not just yourself, but who you’re who’s dependent on you, and set yourself up. Now, again, it’s different for everyone. This is the general 80% you know, the bell curve. This is 80% this is the strategy you want to look at is who’s dependent on you? What are their needs, and calculate what’s your cost of living, and also planned for rainy days, what were some rainy days that you experienced in the last five to 10 years of your life? Imagine if all of those happened over the next month. Because oftentimes when you take this leap, you will be tested. 100% of the time. You say you want something you will be tested, and the world moves for those who are persistent. So plan ahead to make the journey more enjoyable. Because again, if you’re not having fun, you’re doing it wrong.

Corrie Sanders  1:24:46

Yeah, I loved – I love the point that you said about being in a heightened state of emotion. And that’s something that I think a lot of our guests have had in common is that they really sat with that emotion for an extended amount of time. I mean, it was a very calculated risk. To your point, it looks so different for everyone. There’s obviously not a blanket formula. But I love dialing into this is a heightened state of emotion, I need to be aware of it and how do I dial this back to something that’s going to be on a completely different plane and trajectory of emotion that I may not even have experienced yet up to this point in my life. So let’s try to just put our feet in that situation and see how we feel and try to plan for a rainy day, so to speak, or try to plan ahead. I really love that point. And Adam, my last question is, what is I actually think I might be able to answer this for you. But what is your favorite part about being a pharmacy entrepreneur, or in this case, you’re not a pharmacist anymore. So we’ll just dial that back to what is your favorite part about being an entrepreneur?

Adam Martin  1:25:44

 So that’s interesting. I don’t think I consider myself an entrepreneur. And by definition, by all definitions, people like, of course you are, you’re out on your own running your own business, you’re doing all these things. I just consider myself a secret agent for Jesus. That’s it. Because people come to me for all kinds of things. I want to a new career, I’ve helped them do that over and over, I helped you get I’ve 10x people’s income. I’ve done things that would blow your mind, helping them do it, empowering them, I really don’t do anything. I just ask questions. As a coach, I’m literally a professional question asker. That’s all I do. So when it comes to being a professional entrepreneur, a pharmacist entrepreneur, it’s not about me. That’s what I love about it. Because we put all this pressure on ourselves to have it all figured out. We want to have control and certainty of our future. And oftentimes, when we surrender that or even entertaining, the idea of surrender, we think that surrenders giving up and again, how you define things makes a huge thing. Surrendering is one of the most strongest things, or there’s a there’s a good word, clearly I have an English degree, the strongest things you can do. But know that to tie it in it, surrender is one of the most courageous things that you can do, because you’re dying to yourself. And the ways of the kingdom are the opposite the ways of the world, when you die to yourself is when you live. If you want to lead, kneel, if you want to be first, go last. So recognizing that I’m not really I don’t have this plan for this 10 year vision. I’m living on daily bread. And that’s faith. And again, that’s not, you know, not doing anything and expecting money to fall from the sky, which it did and does. But it’s being an active participant in your own rescue, recognizing and being resourceful. These are the gifts I’ve been given, how am I going to steward these responsibly, not for my own gain, but so that I can be a river an avalanche of abundance through which I can pass through and serve to others. It’s not about me, it starts with me. It goes through me I’m required. But it doesn’t end with me. And when you put the focus off yourself, you start to look at how can I give? How can I use this stuff, and give it to other people because again, the secret to living is giving. And then when it’s never about you, you can’t lose. And especially in times when we’re feeling lost or helpless. When you’re feeling helpless, get helpful. Because once you give,it adds this level of gratitude that you can’t even imagine. So my favorite part is and the best way to describe what I do now is I get the honor and privilege to have a front row seat to witnessing miracles. It’s freaking incredible. Like, I literally cry, I’m not kidding, ask my colleagues, I cry two, maybe three days a week, because of the things that I get to witness, the breakthroughs, the marriages that are saved, the all on and on and on. It’s amazing. And having the honor and privilege to be a witness to be a conduit for this is absolutely extraordinary. And we have fun! It’s a blast! So if you’re not having fun, you’re doing it wrong. So if you’re in a job and that doesn’t mean I’m telling you to quit, but say could you be focusing on the wrong thing because you’re influenced by other people in your profession. Maybe you’re hanging out in the wrong Facebook groups. Maybe you need to listen to more YFP. Maybe you need to get more engaged in that community. Maybe you need to, instead of listening to people who are complaining and have a life that you don’t want, maybe you need to connect with people who are living a life through the integrity and character and lifestyle that you actually do want. Because success leaves clues. And I’m gonna give your listeners a big tip. If you want to get success as fast as possible. There’s three simple steps. Number one, proximity,number two, proximity, number three, proximity, whatever you want to attain, get around people playing that level of the game. Because like crabs in a bucket, if you’re in an environment that doesn’t support or encourage your growth, they will always pull you down to their level. So level up and become the smallest person in the room, from the humble perspective to grow and become a part of something. And that’s really intimidating. You might be in that room thinking who am I? I feel out of place. Yes, you’re in the right room. Congratulations! Now be of service. But how can I be of service I have so much to learn? Figure it out. Favorite quote from credit this to Marie Forleo. Everything is figured-out-able.

Adam Martin  01:39

Yeah, exactly, exactly. I can’t credit that one. But it’s the truth. It’s all about innovation. And that was one of the biggest takeaways that I got from University of Pittsburgh School of Pharmacy, our values aligned. leadership, innovation and excellence. Personal excellence is the ultimate rebellion. I learned that from Andy Frisella, creator of 75 Hard, I’ve done Lift Hard, I’m actually finishing my second year of that. Incredible program. It’s free, not not tied to it in any way, but if you want to level up your life, get up on 75 Hard, I did a podcast because I did that while I was a pharmacist highly recommend, but I digress. All kinds of tools, get resourceful. Surround yourself with people who encourage you. That’s the best part of this is, being around people that you want to be around. Because you’re serving at such a high level. I had the honor this past. I was there Saturday through Wednesday. Every year Tony Robbins has the annual coaching meeting. So there were 108 coaches from 29 countries. And these are the most amazing souls you ever met. Because they’re givers. There’s no, there’s friendly competition, but there’s not like backstabbing competition. It’s give give, give without any expectation. They don’t keep tabs, they give with unconditional love. It’s incredible. It’s what we call our chosen family. There’s nothing like it I’ve ever seen or heard of in the world. It is incredible. And they make me want to be better. So get around people that are playing at a level higher than you. And watch what happens. Because proximity is power. So that’s why I’m honored to be a part of this podcast seriously, it’s such an honor, because I’m such an admirer of Tim and you and the team that you have, because it’s such an honorable community of people that want to play and live life at a higher level so that they can create a future for their family that they may have never had. So that they can inspire other people, maybe they’re mentoring, maybe their colleagues that it doesn’t have to be that way. The way that all the loud people are complaining about yes, that’s may be happening. And there’s other stuff too because in every adversity there’s also an opportunity in disguise because again, there’s always both two things happening at the same time. Something that’s gained and something that’s lost and you get to choose which of the two you focus on so choose wisely.

Adam Martin  04:43

Best way is probably at this point. I’m on LinkedIn. Dr. Adam Martin, Also the original on Instagram, all one word The Fit Pharmacists, that’s that’s where I’m most active. But you can also email me at [email protected]

Adam Martin  05:09

All right, let’s go.

Adam Martin  05:45

My pleasure, thank you so much for the time for your kindness. And again, just a reminder, you were all blessed to be a blessing. So go forth, be great and dispense your full potential. 

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Tim Ulbrich  05:56

Before we wrap up today’s show, I want to again thank this week’s sponsor of the your Financial Pharmacist Podcast First Horizon, we’re glad to have found a solution for pharmacists that are unable to save 20% for a down payment on a home. A lot of pharmacists and the YFP community have taken advantage of First Horizon’s pharmacist home loan, which requires a 3% downpayment for a single family home or townhome for first time homebuyers and has no PMI on a 30 year fixed rate mortgage. To learn more about the requirements for First Horizons pharmacist home loan, and to get started with the pre approval process, you can visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/home-loan. Again, that’s yourfinancialpharmacist.com/home-loan.

[DISCLAIMER]

Tim Ulbrich  06:41

As we conclude this week’s podcast and important reminder that the content on this show is provided to you for informational purposes only and is not intended to provide and should not be relied on for investment or any other advice. information in the podcast and corresponding materials should not be construed as a solicitation or offer to buy or sell any investment or related financial products. We urge listeners to consult with a financial advisor with respect to any investment. Furthermore, the information contained in our archive newsletters, blog posts and podcasts is not updated and may not be accurate at the time you listen to it on the podcast. opinions and analyses expressed herein are solely those of your financial pharmacists unless otherwise noted, and constitute judgments as of the date published. Such information may contain forward looking statements, which are not intended to be guarantees of future events. Actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward looking statements. For more information, please visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/disclaimer. Thank you again for your support of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast. Have a great rest of your week.

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YFP 333: Small Business Owner Tax Savings Checklist


On this episode, sponsored by First Horizon, YFP Director of Tax, Sean Richards CPA, EA, summarizes a tax checklist for pharmacy entrepreneurs and other small business owners.

Episode Summary

Too many of us are caught in the trap of only looking at taxes during tax season. As a small business owner, missing the tax mark can have significant consequences in the form of surprise payments due, missed deductions and credits, and constantly wondering if there is something else you should be doing. So whether you are a seasoned business owner or just starting, on this week’s episode, sponsored by First Horizon, YFP Director of Tax, Sean Richards, CPA, EA walks us through a small business owner tax checklist including eight key areas that demand your attention. He touches on the fundamentals of bookkeeping, qualified deductible expenses, the benefits of financial projections to make estimated payments, the significance of S Corp status, insights on determining your owner’s compensation, and much more.

Key Points From the Episode

  • A warm welcome back to the show to YFP’s Director of Tax and CPA, Sean Richards. 
  • Why record keeping is vital for a smooth tax season. 
  • The separation of church and state when it comes to personal business. 
  • Why you shouldn’t fear registering your business as an LLC. 
  • When to consider working with a professional and what to expect from the relationship. 
  • Understanding the basics of bookkeeping. 
  • Defining deductible expenses and why it’s important to understand this term. 
  • The difference between tax planning and tax preparation.
  • Projections and estimated payments: making sure that you’re setting the right money aside. 
  • How to determine if the S-Corp is the right fit for you.
  • Discussing payroll and how to establish your salary as a business owner. 
  • Diving deeper into Section 179 deductibles.

Episode Highlights

“Working with a professional will not solve any challenges or problems you have with disorganization.” — Tim Ulbrich [0:16:01]

“Having a strong understanding of how your business is doing financially is one of the best things that you can do as a business owner.” — Sean Richards [0:17:44]

“Paying yourself an equitable salary is not only the right thing to do by the eyes of the IRS, but it also really helps you think about where the business going and growing.” — Tim Ulbrich [0:45:48]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode

Episode Transcript

[INTRODUCTION]

[0:00:00.8] TU: Hey everyone, I’m Tim Ulbrick, and I want to express my gratitude for you tuning in this week to the YFP Podcast. Each and every week, we’re dedicated to providing inspiration and support on your journey towards achieving financial freedom. 

On this week’s episode, we have a special guest joining us, that’s YFP’s director of tax and CPA, Sean Richards, here to dive into a crucial topic, a tax checklist for small business owners. Whether you’re a seasoned business owner or just starting out, we’ll explore eight key areas that demand your attention. We’ll touch on the fundamentals of bookkeeping, qualified deductible expenses, the benefits of financial projections for estimated payments, the significance of S-Corp status, insights on determining your owner’s compensation, and much more.

Before we dive into this insightful conversation, let’s take a moment to thank today’s sponsor, First Horizon. Afterward, we’re jumping to my conversation with Sean Richards.

[SPONSOR MESSAGE]

[0:00:53.6] TU: Does saving 20% for a down payment on a home feel like an uphill battle? It’s no secret that pharmacists have a lot of competing financial priorities, including high student loan debt, meeting that saving 20% for a down payment on a home may take years. 

We’ve been on a hunt for a solution for pharmacists that are ready to purchase a home loan with a lower down payment and are happy to have found that option with First Horizon. First Horizon offers a professional home loan option, AKA, doctor or pharmacist home loan, that requires a 3% down payment for a single-family home or townhome for first-time home buyers, has no PMI, and offers a 30-year fixed rate mortgage on home loans up to USD 726,200.

The pharmacist home loan is available in all states except Alaska and Hawaii and can be used to purchase condos as well. However, rates may be higher and a condo review has to be completed. To check out the requirements for First Horizon’s Pharmacist Home Loan, and to start the pre-approval process, visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/home-loan. Again, that’s yourfinancialpharmacist.com/home-loan.

[INTERVIEW]

[0:02:04.9] TU: Sean, welcome back to the show.

[0:02:06.5] SR: Thanks. Thanks for having me, yeah. Feels good, we’re through all the extension deadlines, business and individual and now we can hundred percent focus on next year. 

[0:02:14.2] TU: Hard to believe, right? We’re already talking about next tax season. You just had a webinar this week kicking off the beginnings of at least thinking about tax season. I know, many of our listeners, really, this comes to life in January, February, we’re trying to get people to think a little bit earlier, more year-round, and today, we’re focusing on really small business owner tax considerations and what are some things that people will be thinking about, planning about. 

Essentially, a checklist of sorts, and whether people are just getting started with a business or maybe they’ve been at it for a while and they can go back and see, “All right, maybe there’s some holes in the crack in the foundation that they need to go back and fill in.” We really hope that this can be an episode that people will come back and reference into the future as well of something they need to be thinking about as a small business owner as it relates to their taxes.

And Sean, we’re going to talk here and weave in some of our own personal experiences of how these things became obvious that we need to be doing as we’re growing the business but also, Sean, in the work that you’re doing and advising and working with other small business owners as well.

[0:03:15.2] SR: Yeah, there will be anecdotes from real life, with our own accounting of our own businesses and some of the people that we worked with and everything, yeah. There’s a lot in this one, I think it will be a good one to reference back to, I agree.

[0:03:25.9] TU: I know pharmacists like checklists and I know they like to know where we’re going. So, we’re going to cover eight different areas, we’ll go through these one by one and they’re really going to flow into one another, and so I think we’re going to start, maybe a little bit broader, Sean, and then we’ll get more narrow of considerations that folks should be thinking about.

Sean, number one on our list is record keeping. I think that anyone who has been in a business for any time or even if they’ve been thinking about starting, they’re being advised, maybe that’s – some advice have been given is, “Hey, you have to keep records,” But that can get lost, right? You’ve got an idea, you’re running things, it can be busy, tell us about record keeping, why it’s so important, and what people should be thinking about here.

[0:04:02.5] SR: Yeah, like you said, these will kind of flow into each other, and honestly, it’s – you kind of can’t have one of these items without what’s before it, and it all comes back to record keeping, really, at the end of the day. And that makes sense if you’re thinking about taxes and accounting just the way that they are. It’s generally, it’s the nature or say, looking back at something, it’s a historical look. 

So, you’re going to need to have references of the things that you did to be able to do something like that, but there’s just so many things that go into just being able to make decisions about your business when you’re filing taxes at the end of the year, when you’re doing tax planning, which I’ll get into a little bit later about the differences between tax planning and tax preparation. 

It all comes down to having good data, and having good data goes back to having good sourced data and inputs and everything. So just saving down everything that you can, related to the business, and I don’t mean that in the sense of just holding receipts and throwing it in the shoe box and just keeping all of the junk, but just making sure that if you’re doing financial transactions, you’re keeping them in a bank related to your business, you’re running down reports at the end of the month. 

Hopefully, you’re using some kind of ledger system like a QuickBooks or even Excel or something like that but even if not, just being able to say, “Hey, this is the money that I made this year, this is the money I paid this year.” And then even some of the ins and outs that you might not think or something that will directly relate to your taxes or business but might, if you ask your accountant about it, right? 

So, things like loan agreements and any type of employment agreements you have with folks. So, things like that. Just really, anything that you think at any point in time, “Hey, would my accountant ever possibly ask me about this?” or “May this possibly come into play when I’m doing my taxes in the future?” Bear to error on the set of caution, just keep everything. 

That being said, there’s actually some rules in some areas. So, generally speaking, I’d hold on to everything for at least three years. Some states have even longer record retention requirements but generally speaking, hold on to things for at least three years. Just get some cloud storage or a hard drive or something like that so you don’t have to take a physical space and just keep an eye on everything.

[0:06:08.1] TU: Yeah. And we use, at YFP, we use Google Drive for everything. So that becomes our system of – as you mentioned Sean, it’s not just receipts, right? It’s going to be the financial statements, whether someone’s producing those for you or you’re working on that yourself, and it might be a very basic Excel template that you’re starting with and then that will evolve over time. 

But it’s not just the receipts or the financials, it’s also the contracts, right? Things that you’re – you know, W9. I mean, just the – a lot of things that you’re going to be building over time.

[0:06:37.0] SR: Right, and even things that you might not think about. So, like, say you or you have an office space at home that you’re working out of. You can take a deduction for that and there’s a simplified way to do that with a square footage. But there’s also a way you can take actual expenses and generally, you’re going to want to do whatever is the most beneficial.

So, now we’re talking about, okay, mortgage interest and utilities and stuff but even on top of that, depreciations. So now we’re saying, “Hey, how much did you pay for your house 10 years ago?” or something. That might not be something that’s top of mind for folks but if it’s, again, even if it’s tangentially related to the business, there’s a chance you’re going to be able to possibly get a tax savings for it. 

Better to just hold onto it and ask somebody about it, “Hey, can I get a deduction for this? Is it worth me keeping this data, these records here?” And then just have someone tell you, “No, you don’t need that anymore.” And then you can get rid of it.

[0:07:26.2] TU: Yeah, perhaps I should have said this at the beginning, Sean, but I know we’re going to have some people that are listening that maybe have been at this for a while and they’re kind of realizing as we’re going through these eight things like, “Oh, my gosh, like, this is a hot mess” right?

[0:07:35.9] SR: Right.

[0:07:36.6] TU: And that’s normal. You joked about the receipts in the shoe box but there’s a fine line here between, “You can’t predict everything you don’t know yet.” And the system’s going to evolve over time. You don’t want to become paralyzed by all these things but also, you want to be thinking ahead as much as you possibly can, or working with someone that can help you anticipate, that has experience working with others as well.

[0:07:56.6] SR: Exactly.

[0:07:57.4] TU: And I think an important part of that record-keeping, Sean, has been moved to number two on our checklist is this concept of comingling personal and business and really wanting to separate these out and ideally, we’re doing this from jump street, right? So we can have clean records and again, this isn’t always done, whether someone’s anticipating where they’re going to go or maybe they’re confused about how to incorporate or do they need to set up an LLC.

Lots of things to consider here, but talk to us about the importance of separation of church and state when it comes to personal business.

[0:08:29.5] SR: I was going to say the separation of church and state but I wasn’t sure if that was alright. So, I’ve used it before but I held off for a minute. Yeah, I mean, that again, it’s going back to the record-keeping thing, and being able to produce data and produce useful information about your business. So, if you need to say to yourself, “All right, how much money did I make this year or how much did I make, how much did I spend in expenses to my vendors?”

If you have to then go and start pouring through and combing through bank accounts and picking out, “All right, well, this was related to my kid’s school stuff but this was related to the business trip that I went on” and everything, just the notion of even having to do that from the beginning is – it’s just stressful to even think about. There were legal sides to it too. I mean, if you have an LLC and you set up a separate business, it’s always kind of there to keep things separate.

[0:09:15.8] TU: Yeah.

[0:09:16.0] SR: Then it begins to become something where, like you said, you might not know at first, “Hey, I’m starting something out, it’s just a little side project, I’ll use my regular account for now and kind of keep track of things on paper.” Then all of a sudden, things expand and get bigger and hey, maybe you’re incorporating or bringing on partners and stuff, and then you start getting into things, which I won’t really go too deep into because I’ll put the audience to sleep.

But you start talking about your basis in a partnership interest or something like that or your basis as a shareholder in a corporation, and if you’re sharing funds or borrowing things from here and putting it in this pocket and using your personal home equity line of credit to fund the line of business that you’re doing, it just, it muddies the waters too much from the beginning.

So, to any extent, you can keep that stuff separate. That’s the recommendation. That being said, number one is, if you’ve already done some things where, “Hey, I’ve put a couple of expenses on this card” it’s not the end of the world, it’s just being able to identify those things. So, if you can go back now and start to be able to put a report together where you’re chipping away the personal stuff and you have the business stuff ready now or towards the end of the year and not in April or March actually, if we’re talking about business returns.

But the other thing is that you don’t have to necessarily hold yourself to that a million percent. And I know this is offering up not a best practice but there will be times when I have people come to me and say, “Hey, if I go put this big credit card or this big flight on my personal card that I just opened up, I’m going to get myself a huge refund back from my credit or big reward, then I’ll be able to put back in the business” or something like that.

Those things will happen and it makes sense, you have to do it. It just goes back to the record-keeping thing. Let your accountant know or keep track yourself. “Hey, this was a loan from me as a business owner to the business and now, I’m going to actually pay myself back that amount from my business account.” Just keep track of it that way. Don’t completely handcuff yourself but make sure you try to keep things as separate as you possibly can.

[0:11:19.3] TU: Yeah, that’s great stuff. I think too, there’s – you mentioned some of the legal piece, which again, we’re not lawyers but that’s an important consideration of keeping things separate and where the liability protection ends. I think the other thing I see here, Sean, often, is the idea of starting, setting up a business, registering with the state, getting your employer identification number, opening a bank account. 

That seems big and scary, which I think can be intimidating to people that are on the front of it but it’s really not that difficult nor is it that expensive. And so I think, as early as you possibly can, once you’ve got that bank account and the business’s name that’s really going to help you with the record-keeping being separate. The other thing I would just say is from a visibility and a cleanliness as an owner to understanding where your business is at. 

Like, we don’t want to muddy those waters as you talked about, right? So, I want to be able to quickly see, how’s the revenue, how’s the expenses, where are we at? And obviously as you grow, you’re going to look at this period versus another period and what’s the growth or not the growth. What do we need to change?

So, I think really having good insight into what’s the health of the business, the separation helps. And then the other thing I would add, which is a little bit more in the mindset side of things is sometimes when we are just starting, we have some of that resistance and devastation of like, “Well, this is just kind of small and I’m not sure where it’s going to go and so, I’m just going to do it with my personal.” 

Like, believe in yourself, right? Where are we going? And worst-case scenario as we dissolve the business, we shut down the banking account and we move on, but I think really establishing the goals that you have for the business as well.

[0:12:49.4] SR: Right, and we’ll talk about it in a little bit more later but the LLC thing, again, neither of us are lawyers but a lot of people get scared by that because they think, “Oh, it’s a new entity, it’s going to open up this whole separate tax thing.” But most of the time, if you’re a sole proprietorship and you open an LLC, it’s just going to land on your personal tax return like kind of a regular side business anyways. So don’t let that notion of things scare you too much.

[0:13:12.1] TU: All right, number three on our list, Sean. Number three is working with a professional. You’ve alluded to this a couple of different times. Some people, as it gets started, they may work with a professional right away, they may wait, and that could either be an accountant, bookkeeper, both, we’ll talk about bookkeeping basics here in a little bit. 

This was one of the first areas, Sean, that we actually outsourced at YFP, as we were looking at growing the business. We had times where that perspective was very helpful and times where we’re like, maybe not. So, I think this is a challenge where, “You know what? I’m going to hire someone that can really understand my business and advise me.” And I often had this feeling of, “I don’t know what I don’t know”, right? 

So, I’m looking for someone to kind of guide me, rather than just being there when I have questions. So, talk to us about the working with the professional. Maybe the “When”, as well as, what are we looking for in that relationship?

[0:14:01.8] SR: Yeah, and like you mentioned, we’re going to go into bookkeeping basics, but I think having this n your checklist of where you’re in the end of the year, and really any point in the business year is trying to make that determination, “Hey, am I going to do this or not?” You don’t even necessarily have to go down the path of understanding all of the ins and outs of the bookkeeping if you’re going to decide off the bat, “Hey, I’m going to pay somebody to do that for me.” 

Not that you shouldn’t get the basics and stuff, but if you’re going to say, “Hey, I want to outsource this now and have somebody run that whole show”, you don’t necessarily even have to get yourself in the weeds from the beginning. But I think it’s just one of those things that you have to decide, like you were saying, where do you want to be spending your time and your energy and where are your strengths and your weaknesses, right? 

So, if maybe you have a finance background and you say, “I can put a couple of hours towards this and it’s not a big deal, I got a pretty good handle on things and I can run it myself.” That’s perfectly fine but you might be saying to yourself, “Hey, I know a lot of people who just absolutely hate everything to do with numbers” and that’s okay too. If number scare you and you hate numbers, that’s fine but they’re not going to go away. 

So, ignoring them or trying to just say, “Hey, we’ll get there at the end of the year and figure it out then.” I mean, that is one way to do it but it’s certainly not the best way to do it. So, I think it’s just something where you have to really think about where you’re at, what your strengths and weaknesses are, and also what do you want to do when it comes to tax season, right? 

If you’re talking about a sole proprietorship then that’s going to land on your personal return, that’s probably something that you can handle. But if you’re getting into partnerships and corporations, now you’re filing different returns and they’re a little bit more than a regular person’s probably used to with HNR block or whatever. So, that’ might begin to necessitate having a tax professional just sheerly out of expertise. 

So, there’s a lot of different things. I always use the accountant cop-out answer that Tim Baker uses of, “It depends.” But it really does depend. But I think having that decision early on in your process will help plan out the rest of everything else that we’re going to talk about in a minute.

[0:15:57.6] TU: And this is worth saying, and maybe saying again and saying again, which is working with a professional will not solve any challenges or problems you have with disorganization, right?

[0:16:07.7] SR: Correct.

[0:16:08.6] TU: They can advise, they can help, they can – we talked about things like record keeping, but they’re not there from an organization standpoint. I think this is something, again, no judgment, right? People that are just getting started in the business, you’re focusing on the business, you’re growing things, you may not be thinking about organization and records and all that, but at some point, that’s got to become a priority. And if they’re working with someone the first time, that may not be something that is top of mind, so.

[0:16:32.7] SR: Yeah, but a professional though also can, on the flip side and again, it’s not going to be – it’s not going to solve disorganization problems but can definitely help advise with, “Hey, you’ve been struggling keeping track of all these things. Why don’t you get a QuickBooks subscription, we’ll connect all your bank accounts and then I can handle things from there and keep track of things as they come in.” 

And now, all of a sudden, you’re not panicking every month or every year with the thousand transactions. You have a bookkeeper who is going in every week or every month and categorizing things and sending you reports, so. 

[0:17:01.9] TU: Yeah.

[0:17:02.1] SR: Again, it might not solve your problems with a wave of a magic wand but they can definitely get you there.

[0:17:08.7] TU: So, let’s go to number four on our small business owner tax checklist, and Sean, that’s bookkeeping. We’ve danced around this here a couple of times so far but whether or not someone is working with a bookkeeper, there are things they have to be ready for and make sure that they’re tracking. So, talk to us about those items that they have to be ready to report on, whether they’re doing it themselves or whether they’re working with someone that they hire.

[0:17:30.5] SR: Yup, like you said, and like I was just saying before too, even if you have somebody who is doing this for you, reporting on it, and kind of explaining it all to you, you still have to generally be able to understand what they’re talking about, right? I mean, you can only break things down in layman’s terms so much, and having a strong understanding of how your business is doing financially is obviously, one of the best things that you can do as a business owner, I think.

So, if you take a look at – and I’ll talk about the entity types in a little bit – but if you look at the three main, or at least in my mind, tax returns that you’ll have for small businesses typically is a schedule C on your 1040. That’s just your regular kind of sole proprietorship. It can be an LLC, cannot, but just a regular person side gig kind of thing, and then you have a 1065 which is a partnership. 

So that’s the default if you have an LLC and you have more than one person, and then S-Corp, I’m sure a lot of people have heard of that say, 1120-s. Those are the three main forms that you typically see for filing business returns at the end of the year. If you look at the three of those, the main front of the forms, they’re all basically the same thing. You have your revenues, your, “Hey, what were my sales, what was my service income if I had any other kind of income, and what were my expenses?”

And you’ll see that all three of them have generally the same categories for expenses. Like advertising and travel and mortgage interest and things like that. So, it’s pretty similar across the board and you’re going to really have to be able to report on that stuff, no matter what kind of business you run, you’re going to have to know what your revenues are and you’re going to have to know what your expenses are.

Revenues, I’m not really going to spend a whole heck of a lot of time on. I mean, I think people generally kind of have a feel for that, it’s cash in the door. The one thing I would say there is if you’re doing service revenue, it might be a little bit harder to track when you’re actually performing a service and getting paid versus actually selling a good. So, a little bit more keep eye on there but honestly, again, people typically have a good feel for that.

It’s more the expense side that I think things can kind of trip people up on. You typically think, “Hey, whenever I’m spending cash out the door that’s going to be an expense for the business and I can probably deduct it.” And generally, that’s true, but there’s a lot of things that come in that can mix that up a little bit. I mean, property is one thing. I was mentioning before, depreciation, right? 

So, you probably think, “Hey, I’m paying for this office space and I have a mortgage on it. My mortgage, I should be able to write that off, right?” Mortgage interest you can but the mortgage principle, you don’t. You get that back via depreciation but again, that’s something you might not be thinking about or might not really have insight into, or vehicles for example. You can have a billion different ways to write off vehicle expenses. 

Whether you’re taking actual expenses or like a standard mileage rate. It all depends on how much you’re using the vehicle for business purposes, there’s all sorts of depreciation rules and stuff. There’s just a lot when it comes to expenses. So, that’s probably the biggest area on the PNL at least, the profit and loss statement to really have a good handle on when it comes to basic bookkeeping stuff.

[0:20:25.4] TU: Sean, as you’re talking, it’s reminding me of – sorry to interrupt you, it’s reminding me of Schitt’s Creek episode where Johnny Rose – 

[0:20:33.4] SR: Yeah. I already know where this is going.

[0:20:35.0] TU: You can’t just buy things for yourself and deduct them as an expense.

[0:20:39.8] SR: It’s a write-off, it’s just a write-off, exactly.

[0:20:42.1] TU: It’s a write-off, just a write-off.

[0:20:43.4] SR: And hey, a lot of times, and we’ll talk about what’s a deductible business expense. A lot of times, if you’re spending money on a business, it is but you’re correct, you can’t just be like David Rose and just go buy everything.

[0:20:54.3] TU: Oh my gosh.

[0:20:55.7] SR: From the blouse barn. So, that’s the PNL. The balance sheet is kind of – I don’t want to say, it’s the ugly stepchild of the financial statements but it’s the one that people generally have an actually have a pretty good understanding of it without even really knowing what a balance sheet is just because of the nature of two of the biggest components of it. So, your balance sheet is going to be your assets, it’s kind of one-half of the calculation and then the other half is liabilities and equity. 

So, assets are pretty much what you think. If you look up the book definition of an asset, it’s kind of what it is for a business. It’s kind of what it is for a business. It’s basically something that’s expected to generate money for you, it’s a positive sort of resource that you have so cash, receivables, things like that, property, equipment. Again, things that people probably have a pretty good handle on.

“Hey, I have this much cash in the bank, Johnny owes me this much money and I own all these cars” right? Liabilities is the other side, on the other side. So, that’s the opposite of the asset basically. It’s like, “Hey, loans, do I have debt, do I have credit cards, do I have a mortgage? Do I owe my vendors?” Things like that.

So again, people typically have a pretty good handle of that, whether they’re really thinking about it or not, you usually know, “Hey, what are my credit card balances, what’s my line of credit balance?” whatever. Equity is the piece that is sort of – it always just ends up being the plug piece but it’s really important when it comes to taxes. So, if you think about – I was alluding to before, you were in a partnership.

You have a basis in that partnership and again, if you’re not an accountant, you might be thinking like, “What in the world is that?” It’s something that, I don’t want to say it gets overlooked but if you’re not really thinking about it from the beginning and again, getting back to commingling funds and stuff, basis is something that really matters a lot in the tax calculation. But can get muddied very quickly if you don’t have a handle on things. 

And that really comes into play, equity is really where that kind of lands and I’ll caution that, if you look on the balance sheet, you look at equity, that doesn’t mean that that’s your basis or if you have multiple partners and stuff, it doesn’t necessarily equal that. But being able to have a handle on what your equity is, it really is a value of your company if you think about it. It’s your assets minus your liabilities. If everything right now came due and you had to pay off all of your vendors and everything, what do you have left? 

That’s the value for your business. So, like I said, it’s the one that’s overlooked a little bit and it’s not as easy to maintain. Typically you don’t have to report a balance sheet if you have a small business and you’re doing like sole proprietorship or something, but it’s something that if you can get somebody to keep those books for you and be able to have a handle on it.

[0:23:28.2] TU: So, as you mentioned, assets equals liabilities plus equity or we could change the equation around assets minus liabilities equals equity, right?

[0:23:35.6] SR: Again, exactly right.

[0:23:36.6] TU: So, is my high school math still good?

[0:23:38.4] SR: Yes, that would be algebra. Very, very good. 

[0:23:41.2] TU: So, let’s talk more within the bookkeeping basics here. Let’s talk more about the deductible expenses, right? This is probably one of the most common questions that we get you alluded to before that – especially early on the journey, people may have this perception of, “Hey, I can buy anything for the businesses and it’s a deductible expense.” So, define that term just a little bit further and why that’s important, and then some of the most common areas or deductible expenses that small business owners should be thinking about.

[0:24:06.8] SR: Yup. Sure. So, deductibility, it really comes down to the main things. So, is it ordinary and necessary? So, that basically means, if I have a business, is that expense something that actually makes sense in the course of a business? So, if you own a financial education company and you’re buying courses for your employees to take to learn about education and finance and stuff, that’s probably an ordinary expense.

If you’re buying tickets to – I was going to say, the Phillies in the World Series but they’re not really there, I guess. So, if you’re buying tickets to a baseball game or something, that’s probably not an ordinary expense, right? So, sorry for the low blow. I actually was rooting for the Phillies this year, that wasn’t meant to be, it just popped in my head first thing. So, ordinary necessaries, number one. Reasonable, which is in the same kind of vein but similar sort of thing.

So right, if we go back to that example I was just giving in, your employees are purchasing education, financial education courses, right? If those courses cost USD 500, a thousand dollars or something, it’s probably reasonable. If those courses cost USD 250,000 each, that’s starting to be, “Hey, you know, what’s going on there?” In fact, it’s probably not started to be, it’s definitely unreasonable but I think you get what I’m saying.

[0:25:19.3] TU: Yeah. 

[0:25:19.3] SR: And then the third piece is paid during the year or if you’re on the accrual basis incurred during the year. But generally speaking paid but as the case is with everything, there is a lot of exceptions to these rules and with expenses in particular, those exceptions come out quite a bit. So, when we think common deductible expenses, cost of goods sold is going to be the most common or easy to identify if you’re a retail business or you’re selling goods. 

And then the flip side of that, of the analogy I guess is if you have a service business, it’s not as easy to say, “What’s my cost of goods sold?” because you’re not selling a good but being able to determine, “Hey, what are my direct expenses directly related to the services that I’m providing?” So, it’s typically labor, contract labor, things like that. Compensation, so that’s one that is usually is a deductible expense. 

However, it very often is not something that’s a deductible expense if it’s for an owner-employee of whatever this is. So, and you know, I’ll get into a little bit of specifics in a bit with some of these different entity types but if you’re a sole proprietorship and you are paying yourself and it is a little bit contradictory to what I was saying before where you want to be able to kind of keep good books and keep records of everything. 

So, you’re probably saying, “All right, I’m working 40 hours a week on my business. I am paying myself 50 grand a year” whatever it is, that’s a salary expense to me, and then you write that off. But as an owner of a sole proprietorship, that’s not something that’s a deductible expense and that comes into play if you’re S-Corp. Some of those, some of the compensation that you’re getting. 

If it is a salary expense, that will be deductible but then if you’re taking profit distributions, it’s not. So, there is a lot when it comes into compensation. If you’re paying contractors, separate contractors that aren’t yours generally speaking, that will be deductible but more just trying to give the caution flag here of, “Hey, if you are paying anybody particularly yourself, keep an eye on that.” 

[0:27:15.7] TU: That’s really good, Sean. I think that can evolve, right? So, somebody may start as a sole proprietor, they may then have partners or not, they may or may not become an S-Corp. So, this topic of owner’s compensation and a deductible expense is one that may be ongoing. 

[0:27:30.3] SR: Oh, absolutely. It’s something – and we’ll talk about the S-Corp thing in a little bit – but exactly right. And that’s not something that is going to be set in stone and even something like not necessarily related to deductible expenses, but even something like setting aside money for taxes. I mean, you might have a rate in your head that, “Hey, I’m going to put aside 15, 20%” that can change drastically year to year depending on what things are happening with your business or your personal. 

[0:27:52.9] TU: Yeah. 

[0:27:53.3] SR: So just another thing that as with everything else, a lot of these rules and things to keep in mind aren’t necessarily set in stone for any particular point in time. On the subject of compensation, health insurance is another big one. So, that’s one that again, you got to really want to be careful about. I can’t get into all the rules now but the big thing there is really if your spouse is eligible for health insurance through whatever company they work for. 

If it’s unrelated to your small business that usually makes it nondeductible on your side, so just something to keep in mind in there. Again, I won’t go into everything but there is a lot of rules around health insurance. Travel, a lot of rules around that. So, if you’re going on business and you are spending time overnight and the primary purpose is for business, most of those expenses generally speaking will be deductible. 

But if it’s for leisure, probably not and the big one with transportation and travel is commuting to and from your office is never deductible. That’s the big one there that people will say, “Well, what if I work from home sometimes but then I have an office space that I go to?” If that’s a primary office location, probably not going to be a deductible expense, so that’s a big one to keep in mind.

And that’s huge too when you’re thinking about, if I am buying a vehicle and I’m taking these depreciation deductions and stuff, the mileage that you’re commuting to and from your office does not count towards business mileage, so very important to keep in mind. 

[0:29:14.6] TU: You’ve reminded me of that many times, which is good. 

[0:29:17.5] SR: Yeah, yeah, probably in a good way, right? 

[0:29:20.2] TU: Yes, yeah. 

[0:29:20.9] SR: And then you’re rolling your eyes at me kind of way. 

[0:29:22.5] TU: Yeah. 

[0:29:23.2] SR: So, one item I’ll mention as far as the exceptions to the rules I was talking about with being paid during the year is rent. So, I know a lot of people will say, “Oh, perfect. December, I’ll prepay next year’s rent and just be able to take a nice deduction this year for it.” IRS caught onto that one pretty quickly, so rent they actually specifically say, “Hey, if you prepay it, you can only take deductions for the time that it applies to.” 

And then a big one that I mentioned before is the business use of home. So, if you are using a home office space and you’re – it’s dedicated and you’re using that for your business, you usually can’t take a deduction for that and there’s two methods, a simplified, “Hey, what’s my square footage?” and you’re taking five bucks a square foot or you’re taking a percentage of your actual expenses for your home. 

The big thing there though is that I think that I kind of alluded to, it has to be strictly dedicated to that business. So, not like a half office half bedroom kind of situation. It needs to be fully for the business and really – 

[0:30:20.4] TU: Which is important with work-at-home transitions. I’m thinking about where people have bedroom office type of set up, so. 

[0:30:28.0] SR: Yeah and I mean, really, I mean I hit a couple of the big ones there as far as the expenses that are nondeductible that people often think might be. It’s really just; think of the opposite of what I just said, right? So, if you are you’re on and it’s for personal purposes, if you’re driving to and from your office, you’re going to baseball games, entertainment expenses aren’t deductible. 

Federal income tax too, that’s another big one that people think, “Hey, it’s a tax.” Alot of taxes are deductible, property taxes, estate taxes, but the Federal one itself it’s – that would be a circular reference. 

[0:31:00.3] TU: Yes, they were in. 

[0:31:00.8] SR: That they were able to, right? So, if you get that one, then your math’s definitely working nice.

[0:31:05.0] TU: Yeah. Well, I think this is an area and obviously, I’m biased, Sean, we’ve got a team that does this, and your expertise on our team knows how to do small business accounting and bookkeeping and fractional CFO and TAx 4. Obviously, I’m biased there but I think you have to ask yourself as a business owner like this is just a lot to have on your mind, right? 

So, could you learn all this, could you DIY this, could you record keep, could you bookkeep? Like technically the answer is yes. 

[0:31:31.8] SR: Right and it’s possible.

[0:31:33.2] TU: But as you think about your capacity of attention and where you need to be focusing your energy, there is a point where there’s just so many nuances and here we’re really talking more on the side of let’s make sure we’re not calling something deductible that’s nondeductible. I think really the next level is more of the, what can we be doing strategically to optimize our tax situation? And that’s a huge value of having someone in your corner. 

I do want to pause for a moment, I will be remised Sean, if I didn’t explain the Phillies reference to our listeners. 

[0:32:05.6] SR: Okay, all right, that’s fair. 

[0:32:06.8] TU: So, if our listeners don’t know, Sean’s in New Hampshire but he’s a huge Boston sports guy, and just in the past week, Tim Baker’s Phillies were eliminated from the NLCS and I assume as a Red Sox fan, that’s just beaming with joy, right? You’re a Red Sox fan. 

[0:32:23.6] SR: You know, I am a Red Sox fan but honestly, with the Phillies this year, I kind of thought it was a team of destiny sort of thing, I’ll root against a Philadelphia team if they’re going up against the Boston team because I mean it’s the in-law sort of thing. And you know if it’s the 76ers, I don’t like because they’re in conference and stuff but the Phillies, it’s NLAL, I actually was pulling for them. So, I was rooting for them by that one but at the same time, it’s a little bit of win-win. 

[0:32:50.4] TU: But the other thing why Sean is having a good week is I think the listeners know me, I’m a huge Buffalo Bill’s fan, and the New England Patriots miraculously beat the Buffalo Bills this week so.

[0:32:58.8] SR: Yes, which the term miraculous wouldn’t really have made sense for the last 20 or so years but now, it definitely does. So yeah, it’s been a good week but I think I’ll be crashing back down to reality this weekend, so we’ll see. 

[0:33:09.5] TU: Only the Buffalo Bills hand, Bill Belichick a milestone win, so I’m going to leave at that. All right, number five on our list is projections, estimated payments, making sure we’re setting money aside. I’m guessing if we have listeners that have been at this for a while, they’ll probably remember maybe an early part of their journey where it’s like, “Oh, I didn’t think about that” right? 

Didn’t know how to make estimate payments, didn’t think about how much I should set aside, and how I should project that. So, who needs to be making quarterly payments and talk to us about the process of determining that and then setting aside those dollars in planning? 

[0:33:43.8] SR: Yep, so I mean doing a projection, it all kind of comes back to what I was talking about way the beginning of this saying the difference between tax planning and tax preparation. So tax preparation, I actually always use the same analogy, I’ll use it again but I always think of tax planning as being like a film director who can sort of see things as they’re going with the actors and change course and say, “Hey, cut, re-film that, do this over.” 

And then tax preparation is the film editor who gets all the stuff and still plays an important role, works their magic, makes it all look nice. But it’s all stuff that’s already been done and you can’t turn back time and re-film any of those things, right? So, all of the kinds of theme of this entire conversation has been the idea of tax planning and actually being able to project what you think your liability is going to be at the end of the year.

And that’s where you start to get into what you’re just talking about, now we’re not talking about, “Hey, what is and what isn’t deductible” but now it can look at, “Hey, where do we have opportunities to take advantage of tax code and make a purchase and take advantage of accelerated depreciation or change our entity classification or something?” But in order to do that, you need to be able to do a projection. 

In order to be able to do a projection, you need to have books and in order to have books, you have records. So, you see how it all kind of works itself up, right? 

[0:35:00.9] TU: Yeah. 

[0:35:01.4] SR: But yeah, I mean, a projection, I think the biggest thing there, so it all comes down to what your tax classification is. So, if it’s Schedule C, you’re kind of looking at what you expect your profit and loss to be at the end of the year and you’re building that into your 1040 and then similarly, if you’re a chair holder of even an S-Corp or partnership or something, you’re going to get your distributed share of that income on a K1 at the end of the year. 

That’s going to come into your tax return, so it’s a little bit of – most of the time it’s thinking more about the tax on your personal side and less so on the business side. A lot of small businesses actually are passed through entities, where the business itself was not paying the tax, it’s actually the owners or the shareholders. So, when I say tax planning for your business, it actually is really a little bit more tax explaining on the personal side. 

But how does my business play into that and the biggest piece there is that usually small businesses will be subject to self-employment income, number one. And number two is that almost always business income won’t have any withholdings associated. 

[0:36:00.4] TU: Yeah. 

[0:36:00.8] SR: So, that’s when you need to start thinking about, “Do I have to make estimated payments? Should I be setting money aside at the end of the year?” So, there’s ways to do that, I mean again, doing a projection and really kind of you know, projection is kind of what it sounds like, you’re basically building a tax return now just with what you think it’s going to end at the end of the year. 

So doing that is good and then that will get you, “Hey, this is what I think my tax bill is going to be and this is what I think my withholdings are going to be” and everything and if you think you’re going to owe more than a thousand dollars, you should be making estimated payments, that’s the general rule. There’s something called the safe harbor, so the easy calc there, the easiest way to do it and being ultra-conservative as accountants tend to is take last year’s tax liability and multiply it by 110%, 1.1. 

And as long as you pay that in by the end of the year through withholdings and/or estimated payments or some kind of combination, then you won’t have any penalties. You can also do that with this year’s 90% of this year’s tax. But if you can – what I’m getting out with that, that’s not a known number, your last year’s tax liability is on your – 

[0:37:04.6] TU: More conservative, yeah. 

[0:37:05.5] SR: This year’s tax liability, you probably have a good handle on it but it could change, right?

[0:37:09.8] TU: Especially if you’re growing or there – just thinking about variability and this is another example, just a peak behind the curtain, Sean, of, you advising us here at YFP, this is something we’re looking at you know evolving into the future. So, you know we’re big believers in the Profit First methodology. We’ve talked about that before on the show, great book, great resource. 

There is a recommendation there for X percent of all revenue should go into a tax account. But what we found for us is that wasn’t a perfect number, because of just our personal situation as well as some of the tax benefits of being in the great State of Ohio, you know? 

[0:37:09.8] SR: Right. 

[0:37:43.5] TU: And then, so there’s – that’s one example where things are unique, and then we kind of evolve to our own calculation, which I would say is probably closer to maybe the general rule of thumb that’s out there of, “Hey, take 25%, set it aside” and then we realize, “Hey, that’s got some holes because tax situations are different.” You know, how many kids you have, what’s the total household income, all of these variables, right?

So, I think the projection piece along with what you’re suggesting on the safe harbor is so important, right? As you’re planning for the business because you want to find yourself in that situation where you don’t want a bunch of money sitting in an account that as a growing business, if you didn’t have to make that much in tax payments you could have utilize to grow the business. 

There is an opportunity cost there but we also don’t want to be surprised and put a stress on the cash flow of our business that we go to file in April and we’ve got this big tax bill due. 

[0:38:33.9] SR: Exactly, it’s a push-and-pull kind of thing. 

[0:38:35.6] TU: Yeah. 

[0:38:35.9] SR: So, being able to – at any extent that you’re able to nail that down as close as you can, like you’re saying, it’s better that way, right? You don’t want to loan the government any more money than you have to but you also don’t want to end up owing a ton of money that you may or may not have or on top of that, have any penalties where I think is associated with it too, so yeah. 

[0:38:52.8] TU: Number six on our checklist, Sean, relate to the S-Corp status, I would pursue maybe outside of, “Hey Sean, can I deduct this expense?” maybe the second most common question or pretty close to the top is, “Should I be a S-Corp?” It’s one of those things that people just throw out there of, “Hey, there’s tax benefits of being an S-Corp status.” Tell us more about what that means and when people may be asking or should be asking that question. 

[0:39:14.8] SR: Yeah, and I mean again, the theme of the whole thing is that you’re kind of looking at these things and at least at one point in the year, hopefully around now, but actually more ongoing, but at least at one point in the year saying, “What is my tax classification now and is that what it’s going to be next year or does that make the most sense next year?” So, before I even do S-Corp I’ll give the three like I had mentioned earlier in the call. 

The three most common ones that I would think of small businesses as a sole proprietorship, one person that’s what you see on your schedule, see they call it, and if you – and the biggest thing with this is that for all of these different classifications, LLCs can be any one of these. That’s the thing, if people will say, “Oh, I’m an LLC” any one of these, an LLC is a legal entity distinction versus these are tax classifications. 

You can be an LLC and classify in any one of these, as long as you fit the right requirements. So, that’s one thing to keep in mind. Again, people hear that, they think it means something different or, “Hey, my taxes are going to be different.” It doesn’t necessarily mean the case. So, sole proprietorships are the most common. If you file an LLC for a single person, that’s the default. 

The biggest thing there is that, that is subject to self-employment tax, and then again, that does not have – there’s no withholding. So, you’d want to make sure that you’re keeping track of any estimated payments and stuff. Partnerships is the default for an LLC with two plus people. So, if you and your friend or you and your sibling or something go start a business and you start an LLC, the default for that one is a partnership and that actually is a different tax return and everything. 

So that’s where again, it begins to become a little bit more than just, “Hey, I’m starting this little business.” Your share of ownership income from a partnership is subject to self-employment taxes. So, when you get your K1 at the end of the year from your partnership, that is subject to self-employment tax, which basically is just the employer portion of FICA that you don’t have because you don’t have an employer, it’s you. 

S-Corps is the more kind of exciting piece. So that is, you can have any number of owners but that is where you’re actually incorporating your business and you’re basically – it’s being taxed like a corporation now. And the biggest thing with that is that you don’t have the self-employment tax portion for what you get on your K1. So, if you were in a partnership today and you and your partners each got a K1 and reported that income, there’s self-employment tax on it. 

And then you become an S-Corp tomorrow, effectively that same stuff that’s on that K1, that same income is not subject to self-employment tax. Now, you’re probably thinking to yourself, “Wow, that sounds too good to be true.” It’s not that it is, it’s just that there are catches associated with it and the biggest catch is that when you make that jump to S-Corp, you have to be able to pay yourself as an owner a reasonable W2 salary with the FICA withholdings and everything, AKA, self-employment tax on top of any profit distributions that you’re going to be making, and that right there is the deciding point. 

Well, what people will probably say is, “Okay, well, what’s a reasonable salary and when can I make that?” and there comes my cop-out accountant answer of, “It depends” and it really does depend because you can think about a million different things. “All right, hey, I am starting a small business and I am going to be the CEO and I’m a pharmacist who is going to be providing advisory on pharmacy things.” 

Okay, is your salary a CEO salary? Because I’m sure if I Google CEO salary, the average is probably 10 million dollars or something. Is it pharmacist’s salary? Is that, I mean, are you doing mostly pharmacy-related things? Well, you’re probably will also going to be doing some bookkeeping and administrative stuff too, right? So, is it kind of an admin salary? Figuring out what that is, there really is no science to it. 

It is more of an art than a science. You have to be able to say, “Hey, this is a job that I’m doing, you know, these are comparable salaries of people that are making” and you have to be able to pay yourself, “Hey, this is what I feel and I truly believe isn’t a reasonable wage per my industry per the work that I’m doing and everything”, and you need to be able to do that again before you make that jump to S-Corp. 

And in order, once again, to determine if you can do that, you need to be able to say, “Hey, where am I in the books? Where do I expect my profit to be this year? Do I think I’m going to have a ton of profit on my K1 or I’m going to have a lot of self-employment tax? I don’t want to pay that self-employment tax, so now can I switch to S-Corp?” Well, let’s see. Do I have enough room in my profits from last year to cut myself a salary that the IRS will think is reasonable compared to other entrepreneurs that are doing the same sort of thing? 

I don’t know. I mean, I really would have to look at your finances and we’d have to talk about a lot of things. It’s a very, very long conversation but it’s a very important one because it can save you a lot of money in taxes. But it all kind of comes down to – my questions back to you will be, “What’s your expected profit and loss look? What have you been taking as distributions so far?” 

And if you can’t answer those questions, then we can’t even have this conversation. So it’s a lot of it depends but it all once again comes back to being able to have the numbers to even start to have that conversation to begin with. So, if anybody is still awake, I hope that kind of explains that. 

[0:44:27.8] TU: It’s good. 

[0:44:28.1] SR: I’m sure that put quite a few folks to sleep. 

[0:44:30.6] TU: No, it was good because this comes up so much, right? We’ve talked about this internally a lot of what’s the right amount of paying ourselves and how do we determine that and it’s so subjective, right? And number seven on our list was going to be payroll and paying yourself enough. So, you did a nice job of covering on both of those in one. 

[0:44:45.2] SR: Yep, exactly. 

[0:44:46.0] TU: And you know, just for some insights and how we have handled this, not to say this is advice in any way, shape, or form, and I would reference people. There’s a book called, Simple Numbers, Straight Talk, Big Profits! that is written by Greg Crabtree that I think does a nice job of addressing this issue. 

[0:45:01.6] SR: Yes. 

[0:45:02.1] TU: Not just from a, “Hey, the IRS is going to be concerned” if you’re kind of applying like a stockless salary, but also I think what’s important about this is, are you thinking about your salary in the context of what the business is and potentially is worth? So, what I mean by that is let’s say Tim Baker and I decided that at some point we want to wake up and sell our business. 

Well, if somebody buys it, they may not want to operate it necessarily. Maybe they do but if they don’t, they’re going to be asking themselves, “Hey, what does it cost to replace Tim or what does it cost to replace Tim?” And so if that answer is X and we’re paying ourselves a lot less than that – because then you could argue, are we really giving ourselves a true look at the profitability, the actual profitability of the business? 

And I think paying yourself an equitable salary is not only is the right thing to do by the eyes of the IRS but it also really helps you think about where is the business going and growing. Now, there is a balance there, right? If you don’t have to pay yourself USD 200,000, you can save on taxes and argue you’re paying yourself a reasonable salary, then obviously you want to do that. 

So, good resource and reference I think about with that book I mentioned. Sean, number eight on our list, which is our last item on the small business owner checklist, is seeing about some of the big purchases. We talked about deductible expenses but specifically want to dig a little bit deeper around Section 179 deductible expenses. Tell us more there. 

[0:46:26.1] SR: Yeah, that’s so – that’s really when you think about deductible expenses, the IRS basically says, “Hey, nothing is deductible unless we tell you that it is pretty much.” And when they start to incentivize larger purchases it’s because that’s what they want people to invest in. So, Section 179 is effectively the government’s way of saying, “Hey, typically you have these big things like vehicles and other equipment type purchases that you’d have to pay for upfront now but then only be able to take a little bit into depreciation every year.” 

“That’s not fair to small businesses, we want to encourage folks to put money to the business. So, we’re going to let you if you buy things that fit these bills, take that money on the first year.” Which is awesome to be able to do, especially if you have to make these purchases and it makes sense for your business. But the biggest thing by far that I would say and once again, it rolls back into everything is you really want to make sure like, “Hey, do I have to make these purchases at some point now or in the near future or am I just doing this so I can get a deduction this year?” 

Because yeah, it’s great to get a tax deduction but that’s really only a percentage. It’s not a credit, it’s not a dollar-for-dollar savings, it’s really only a percentage of a savings. So, if it’s something that you have to spend, “Hey, I’m going to have to buy a car next year anyway and I have all this profit this year and I can take that depreciation and offset those profits,” cool, but you need to be able to figure that out and if you don’t have good numbers, you can’t do it. 

[0:47:43.5] TU: Yeah. 

[0:47:43.5] SR: And if you look at your numbers and saying, “Hey, I’m going to break even right now and I don’t need a car,” then you probably shouldn’t be going out there and trying to take advantage of the Section 179 file. 

[0:47:51.0] TU: Yeah, great stuff. We’ve covered a lot, Sean, on this and we’re going to come back to these topics in the future on the show but we want to have this one episode that we could point back to and say, “Hey, small business owner” again, whether you’ve been established and you want to go back and look at some of these things or you’re just getting started wanting to build a strong foundation, we wanted this episode to be that resource. 

So, looking forward to building upon this in the future as well. If folks want to learn more about the tax and accounting services that we offer, that Sean and his team offer at YFP Tax, you can go to yfptax.com. We’ll link to that in the show notes as well. You can book a free discovery call to learn more about those services, we’ll learn more about you to determine whether or not there’s a good fit there. 

For business owners, we offer everything from business tax filing, bookkeeping, all the way up to fractional CFO services, payroll, so depending on where you’re at in the journey, it might be, “Hey, we need all of that” or “We just need a portion of that” and we could grow together over time. So, Sean, thanks so much again for your time. 

[0:48:47.3] SR: Thank you, Tim, have a good one. 

[END OF INTERVIEW]

[0:48:48.9] TU: Before we wrap up today’s show, I want to again thank this week’s sponsor of the Your Financial Pharmacists Podcast, First Horizon. We’re glad to have found a solution for pharmacists that are unable to save 20% for a down payment on a home. A lot of pharmacists on the YFP community have taken advantage of First Horizon’s Pharmacist Home Loan, which requires a 3% down payment for a single-family home or townhome for first-time home buyers, has no PMI on a 30-year fixed rate mortgage. 

To learn more about the requirements for First Horizon’s Pharmacist Home Loan and to get started with the preapproval process, you can visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/home-loan. Again, that’s yourfinancialpharmacist.com/home-loan.

[DISCLAIMER]

[0:49:33.4] TU: As we conclude this week’s podcast, an important reminder that the content on this show is provided to you for informational purposes only and it is not intended to provide and should not be relied on for investment or any other advice. Information on the podcast and corresponding materials should not be construed as a solicitation or offer to buy or sell any investment or related financial products. We urge listeners to consult with a financial advisor with respect to any investment. 

Furthermore, the information contained in our archived newsletters, blog posts, and podcasts is not updated and may not be accurate at the time you listen to it on the podcast. Opinions and analyses expressed herein are solely those of Your Financial Pharmacist unless otherwise noted and constitute judgments as of the dates published. Such information may contain forward-looking statements, which are not intended to be guarantees of future events. Actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements. For more information, please visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/disclaimer. 

Thank you again for your support of the Your Financial Pharmacist Podcast. Have a great rest of your week.

[END]

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YFP 332: Lan Ho Founder of Fat Miilk


On this episode, sponsored by Pyrls, Lan Ho, PharmD, Founder of Fat Miilk, shares her journey going from pharmacist to full-time entrepreneur featured on Gordon Ramsay’s Food Stars.

Episode Summary

Joining us this week on the YFP Podcast is Lan Ho, PharmD, Founder of Fat Miilk Vietnamese Coffee Company based in Chicago, Illinois. Tune in as we dive into her career journey in pharmacy before she shares why she started Fat Miilk, what she learned after appearing on Gordon Ramsay’s Food Stars, the most important thing she’s learned about herself since starting the business, and what lies ahead for Fat Miilk in the coming years. We discuss every step of Lan’s incredible journey to full-time entrepreneurship which began with an unexpected furlough from a retail pharmacy position in in 2020. We explore the rewards available when you are willing to take a risk, the biggest areas of growth she has experienced along the way, and why she is choosing a clicks-to-bricks approach to building her business.

About Today’s Guest

Lan Ho is a first-generation Vietnamese American who made a bold career change from pharmacist to beverage entrepreneur after being furloughed during the pandemic. She pivoted to pursue her dream and successfully launched Fat Miilk – Chicago’s first Vietnamese CPG coffee company. The brand saw instant global recognition when Bon Appetit listed Fat Miilk on their “Highly Recommend” list. Fat Miilk can be found in publications, including Eater, TimeOut, Thrillest, Roast Magazine, and more. Lan is recognized as a thought leader in consumer branding, customer experience, CPG, and the coffee industry. She was recently a finalist on Gordon Ramsay’s Food Stars on FOX network, where she represented her brand, leadership, and entrepreneurial story. Lan is currently expanding Fat Miilk’s reach through e-commerce and with Chicago’s first Vietnamese coffee bar showcasing a full cultural experience. She aims to inspire more minority representation in mass media, entrepreneurship, and executive roles.

Key Points From the Episode

  • Introducing Lan Ho, PharmD, Founder of Fat Miilk Vietnamese Coffee Company.
  • Her start in pharmacy fuelled by her parent’s goals for her education and career.
  • Why it is so important to embark on self-discovery work before committing to a career.
  • What motivated Lan to start Fat Miilk, the first Vietnamese CPG company in Chicago.
  • Benefits and challenges of entering a saturated industry. 
  • How Fat Miilk is merging two industries together.
  • What it means to protect your energy as an entrepreneur.
  • Lan’s experience on Gordon Ramsay’s Food Stars and what she learned about herself.
  • The rewards of taking up space and being willing to take a risk. 
  • Feedback Lan received from experts on the show. 
  • How the creative agency, Truffl, challenged every branding decision behind Fat Miilk. 
  • How Lan’s 2020 furlough led her to take the plunge into entrepreneurship.
  • The biggest areas of growth and learning while transitioning into entrepreneurship.
  • The clicks and bricks business approach that Lan is adopting for the product. 
  • Engaging customers to make a difference in climate change.

Episode Highlights

“If you hit on that unique proposition, you will stand out and you will win big.” — @iamlanho [0:10:17]

“In entrepreneurship, you have to protect your energy, especially in the beginning.” — @iamlanho [0:14:54]

“Do an audit about what you’re telling people and until you’re at a place to invite their opinions or their feedback into your life, keep it to yourself. Do yourself that favor.” — @iamlanho [0:17:09]

“When you transition from you know, going from a corporate structure into anything on your own, you are the corporate structure. A lot of people don’t know that.” — @iamlanho [0:36:02]

“[Having] their online presence but they also have this in-person on-the-ground brand experience [which is] so necessary for an emerging market.” — @iamlanho [0:40:07]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode

Episode Transcript

[INTRODUCTION]

[0:00:00.8] TU: Hey everybody, Tim Ulbrick here, and thank you for listening to The YFP Podcast, where each week, we strive to inspire and encourage you on your path towards achieving financial freedom.

This week, I welcome pharmacist turned entrepreneur, Lan Ho, founder of Fat Miilk Vietnamese Coffee Company that’s based in Chicago, Illinois. We discuss her career journey in pharmacy, why she started Fat Miilk, what she learned after appearing in the finale of Gordon Ramsay’s Food Stars, the most important thing she’s learned about herself since starting the business, and what lies ahead for Fat Miilk in the coming years. 

Let’s hear a brief message from today’s sponsor, Pyrls, and then we’ll jump into my interview with Lan.

[SPONSOR MESSAGE]

[0:00:38.3] JW: This is Justin Woods from the YFP Team with a quick message before the show. If you’re tired of relying on shared passwords or spending hundreds of dollars for drug information, we’ve got great news for you. Today’s podcast sponsor, Pyrls, is changing the game for pharmacy professionals. Pyrls offers top drug summaries, clinical teaching points, a drug interaction checker, calculators, and guideline reviews, all in one user-friendly resource.

They also recently added free weekly quizzes to test your Pharmacotherapy knowledge. Whether you’re on your web browser or accessing the mobile app, Pyrls has got you covered. Visit pyrls.com, that’s P-R-Y-L-S.com, to get access to more than 25 free Pharmacotherapy charts to get you started. Upgrade your drug information resources today with Pyrls, don’t miss out on this game-changing resource.

[INTERVIEW]

[0:01:33.3] TU: Lan, welcome to the show.

[0:01:34.9] LH: Hi, happy to be here.

[0:01:36.8] TU: Well, it’s an honor to have you. I ran across your entrepreneurial journey after a former student of mine reached out and said, “Hey, you’ve got to check out this pharmacist turned entrepreneur, she’s going to be on the final of Gordon Ramsay’s Food Stars.” Of course, I said, “Heck yeah, pharmacist, entrepreneur, I’ll be following that.”

[0:01:55.1] LH: Yes.

[0:01:55.2] TU: As I learn more about your story, I was fascinated with the work that you’ve been doing, why you’ve gotten into this area of work, and I wanted to introduce it to our community as well. And so, we’re going to spend most of our time on your entrepreneurial journey but let’s start with your career in pharmacy. What drew you into the profession, where did you go to school, and what area of practice did you find yourself in after graduation?

[0:02:18.5] LH: Yeah, absolutely. I’m happy to dive into all of that because it definitely is quite the story. My start in pharmacy, I will say, look, I probably did it for all the wrong reasons, right? And I say that because of multiple things. One, I come from a family, both my parents are Vietnam refugees, right? So, they are always pushing us to go for that really secure and stable career path, and the only thing that they really know is education is the kind of the only way to do it, right? 

And so, you know, me and my siblings were all in healthcare and I think when you’re at a young age and you don’t have a plan B and you didn’t grow up having role models and people to show you that there are other ways to kind of live life and go about your careers, the only thing that we really knew was to go to school and do something that’s secure and stable and get that degree, right?

So, if I had a backup plan, if I kind of knew what I wanted to do, I’m sure I could have you know, really posed a really good argument to my parents and be like, “This is what I want to do instead, I want to start my business, I want to go into the creative arts, I want to – you know, all these things” but I didn’t have a plan B, right? So, I was easily persuaded into doing something that my parents wanted me to do and at the time, that was pharmacy, you know? 

Pharmacy in Vietnam is considered like the gold standard for like one of the best career paths and just lifestyle and so, I really conform to that, made my dad really, really happy. The only pharmacist in the family and you know I was good at school. I’m good at learning, I’m good at teaching myself anything and I excelled in education and in higher education and went there, got my pharmacy degree, and had a great relationship with the district manager at Walgreens and I always thought I was going to do a fellowship but during my rotation…

[0:04:14.2] TU: Interesting.

[0:04:14.6] LH: Yeah. During my rotation with the district manager at Walgreens, we just vibed, it was all about relationships, right? And we just had a really, really good time together, really loved that he offered me a job after I graduated and so, that’s how I ended up in community pharmacy.

[0:04:32.3] TU: I love that story man, and I think it’s so important that we share, we all share our collective stories, right? You know, I think sometimes, going into pharmacy school, which could be true of medicine and I’m sure other health professions, you know sometimes, there’s the internal motivation, sometimes there’s external motivations, sometimes people have external motivations that you know over time, they fall in love with the professional work that they’re doing, other times, they don’t, and there is no one right path, right? 

And I think for everyone that’s on their own journey just as you are, just as I am, so important to do that self-discovery work and really, to find the path, you know, that’s most meaningful and I think as your story highlights so well, you know very rarely is one’s career path a straight line, right? I think sometimes in pharmacy school, I graduated in 2008 and I often felt the pressure and I can tell even graduates today, they feel this pressure that you know, there’s graduation, you take that first job or fellowship or residency, and that you know, from there on, it’s going to be one straight path.

And my career has looked like left turns, right turns, some straightaways, right? But – and there’s a lot more to go and I think as your journey, you know, that is the case as well and just a lot of wisdom there to share and I think as you continue on your entrepreneur journey, perhaps this is just one of many twists and turns that you’re going to take, you know, throughout your career. So, let’s talk about that entrepreneur or business journey. Give us the information on your company Fat Miilk. What is the product and offering and why did you start it?

[0:06:03.0] LH: Yeah. So, Fat Miilk is the first Vietnamese CPG and for people who don’t know, CPG stands for consumer packaged goods, we’re the first Vietnamese CPG coffee company in Chicago, right? And so, a lot of people don’t know is that you know, Vietnam is the number one producer of Robusta in the world. We’re a huge player in the coffee industry and what you’re seeing now is just a wave of first-generation Vietnamese entrepreneurs who are really showcasing that and really trying to put Vietnamese coffee on the map, right?

I think prior to like, the last couple of years, like one or two years ago, you could not walk into any major retailer, Walmart, Whole Foods, whatever, and find Vietnamese Robusta beans on the shelf. It just didn’t exist. And so, I’m really playing in an emerging category right now and we’ll say, prior to launching Fat Miilk, you know I’ve conceptualized this idea forever. You know, Vietnamese coffee in my household was a staple. 

You know, we grew up on that stuff and I just always thought, “You know, why do you have to go to a Vietnamese restaurant? Like a pho restaurant or a bánh mì restaurant to really get Vietnamese coffee?” and sometimes you don’t even know if it’s really Vietnamese coffee, right? It’s just – it’s just the way that it’s you know, presented and so, I saw this opportunity, not just to use Vietnamese coffee as the medium to what I want to present out there but also, like, if you look at what I’ve built with Fat Miilk, you know, you see so much of the story there.

So much of like, the story of the people behind the bean and just the culture, right? And that’s really what I enjoy. I really enjoy creative writing, creative strategy, and I love connecting with the consumer and that’s where I thrive. So, long story short, Fat Miilk is a coffee company, we sell whole-bean coffee. I import it directly from Vietnam and we have some really other exciting product lines that we are pushing forward as well but on top of that, we’re building out our first Chicago flagship storefront at the same time.

[0:08:07.6] TU: Ooh, that’s awesome.

[0:08:09.1] LH: Yeah, a lot going on.

[0:08:10.9] TU: And we’re going to talk about that as we head towards the end kind of, what is the next stage, where do you see the future and I think that’s obviously an important part of that and I hope our listeners will go check out what you’re doing. I’ll link to your website, fatmiilk.com. That has two “I’s” Just so people know as they’re looking that up. Please grab some coffee, you know, you’ve got some other product on there as well.

My wife and I have been working through a five-pound bag over the last few weeks, it’s delicious and I would just highly encourage you know, our listeners to check it out, and I will say, Lan, one of the things that really stood out to me is I did some background research on what you’re building is the strength that you have in storytelling and branding and marketing. You mentioned that creative pursuit, that is obvious in the work that you’re doing. So – 

[0:08:52.5] LH: I appreciate that.

[0:08:52.9] TU: You know, lean into that strength. I know you are but it’s really an incredible one to watch. Now, I’ve got some questions. You know, coffee, beverage, it’s a big industry, right? And for those that watch Shark Tank, you know that the Sharks are quick to object to beverage companies knowing that this is a crowded space. So, I think you answered this in part when you talked about the Vietnamese heritage of this product. But tell us more about what makes this product unique, especially as you think about coffee and beverage being such a big industry.

[0:09:22.7] LH: Yeah. You know, I think when people see such a big industry, they get a little intimidated by it, right? And there’s some major players in the coffee industry but I almost see it as an opportunity, right? Like, I’m not reinventing the wheel here, I’m playing in an industry that already has demand and it’s actually pandemic-proof. Like, if you look at coffee industry, I think it drastically increased during the pandemic, right? 

And so, this is something that people see as a daily necessity, it’s a commodity. I mean, you know, and if you’re able to enter a market that already is going to stay you know, and create something that’s niche but also, unique you can really, really stand out, right? So, when I look at really saturated markets, even in pharmacy, it’s community pharmacies or independent pharmacies, there’s always a way. 

There’s always a way and if you hit on that unique proposition, you will stand out and you will win big, okay? And so, I think we’re playing within the coffee industry at large, which is like a 130-billion-dollar worldwide industry by the way but the Vietnamese coffee category is new in the US, right? Obviously, you know, overseas and in Vietnam and Australia and a lot of the other neighboring countries, Vietnamese coffee is very known and popular. 

But here in the US, I have an opportunity to really be a first mover and I think that if done right and you do it with intentionality, you do it with heart and you do it with community, that to me, you can create a legacy brand out of that and that’s what I intend to do.

[0:11:05.0] TU: Yeah, I love that, right? Because I think that you know, in this example exists in pharmacy, you’re spot on. You know, we tend to speak in generalities, right? You know, independent pharmacy is dead, community pharmacy is changing or evolving but there’s niche markets, right? And you talked about, in your space, you know, obviously, there’s a niche. You know, what’s your differential advantage, what are you bringing that’s different?

Obviously, you know, you are in what you’re building and I think that’s so important, you know, that we kind of get away from some of those generalities, especially speaking about business, and really trying to figure out, “Okay, what’s the problem that we’re trying to solve, what’s the opportunity and how can I bring something that’s different or new or unique or serves a niche that may be otherwise hasn’t been served as it relates to this product?”

[0:11:46.4] LH: Absolutely. I think that’s just business in general, right? Like, you can’t go into a market and just do something that everybody else is doing, right? That’s not good business. You have to look at the market and see what you can bring to the table and what makes you unique and I will say with Fat Miilk when I look at – I will say, right now, being a Vietnamese coffee company is and can be enough, right? Because we are so new to the market. 

But I will say, that’s not what I – that’s not the angle that I’m taking. What I bring with Fat Miilk is a lifestyle, you know? And so, when you look at it, and we’re launching our new website actually on November 15th in this whole Fat Miilk 2.0 situation is, I really been able to capture the last, first, you know, two years of Fat Miilk, analyze what was working and what wasn’t working, and really determine who we are and who we’re not and got down to the roots and realized we need to exist for more reasons than to just make Vietnamese coffee accessible.

And so, when you look at Fat Miilk and you know, our intention to expand, what really makes us different is a whole lifestyle approach to Vietnamese coffee but we’re also merging two industries together. There’s this streetwear, very hype culture that exists in you know, a lot of sneaker and streetwear brands into a food and beverage company, you know? And so, at the core of all of that is this hustle mentality with a lot of humility, right? And that’s how I grew up. 

You know, both of my parents coming here and that’s something that I always wanted to honor, like, I don’t want to be this incredibly luxury brand but I’m going to be something that’s relatable to the times, right? And at the end of the day, me going from pharmacy to this was something that was so intentional about taking a bet on yourself, right? Which then everyone says, and really doing it with humility and doing it with intentionality, with value at its core.

[0:13:42.5] TU: Yeah, I think that’s really interesting, Lan because I think that concept, you know, the hustle mentality, the taking a bet on yourself, I think a lot of pharmacists struggle with that, you know? And part of that goes to – you know, we often talk about it in the show. The golden handcuffs of you got a doctorate degree, you got a six-figure income, you got USD 200,000 of student loans.

[0:14:00.1] LH: Yeah, yeah. 

[0:14:01.0] TU: It’s hard to take that risk, it’s hard to you know, have that hustle mentality when obviously, you’re making that kind of income and I think you know, as you alluded to, that goes back to in part, your upbringing and some of that entrepreneurial experience that you obviously have, and one of the things I want to dive into a little bit deeper, and you mentioned at the top of this episode was some of the family impact on your journey, not only the pharmacy but obviously on entrepreneurship as well and you’ve talked about publicly on Gordon Ramsay’s Food Stars. 

I’ve also seen it referenced in other articles that have featured your story that you didn’t share your business pursuits with your family until after you have launched the business for some time. One article I read said, “Long story short, I started an entire company, pretending to be a full-time pharmacist and later came clean on national television while competing for Gordon Ramsay’s partnership.” Tell us more about that.

[0:14:52.3] LH: Yes. Look, in entrepreneurship, I say this over and over and over again, you have to protect your energy, right? And especially in the beginning. Look, Vietnamese coffee, I went from being a pharmacist to you know, dealing lattes and so for my parents, you know, especially my dad, he didn’t understand that and for me, I was like, “I don’t think you need to understand it right now, you know?”

Like, I think when a lot of people have their opinions and tell you, you know, “Oh, I like that idea, I don’t like that idea, why are you doing this?” It’s exhausting and it’s taxing too. Like just the emotional capacity that you have and the mental capacity, and when you’re starting a business, you need your best self, you know? And there are just so many moments where I would kind of try to bring it up, you know?

And kind of talk about Fat Miilk and how like coffee, there’s this huge opportunity in Vietnamese coffee in the US, blah-blah-blah, like all this stuff and I was just presented with so much resistance, you know? And that to me was something that was so evident, that as I’m building Fat Miilk, I have to build it to a stage where there is no turning back, you know? And so, I was going to do it no matter what because I mean, look, we don’t have to go into it but I was a pretty miserable person when I was a pharmacist.

And I just knew that this was not the career choice for me and that I was going to do something creatively and I was going to do it without my parents and that was a big secret that I kept to myself and a lot of it was for me, more than anything because if I knew I invited that kind of energy into just the building stage of Fat Miilk, I would have had to not only find the strength to keep going but find the strength to resist that feedback, right? 

Like, that negative energy that I just did not need in my life while I was trying to make something happen and it all comes from a good place. I don’t – you know, the people who tell you, who are going to challenge you the most are the people that probably love you the most, right? So, there’s no ill feelings there. It’s just, for me, it was so important, and I always encourage people, watch – do an audit about what you’re telling people and until you’re at a place to invite their opinions or their feedback into your life, keep it to yourself. Do yourself that favor.

[0:17:22.1] TU: Yeah, you have to protect your energy. I love that. Such words of wisdom, you know, that you shared there and so important. I got that vibe, right? When I watched the show and I followed some of your journey, read some articles, I got the vibe that it was coming from a place of love and you know, I think that for the entrepreneurs that are listening, like, they know that well around the need to protect their energy. 

It’s so important and I think you also shared very well that also, you know, when you think about who is around you and some of the energy that you’re surrounding yourself with and you know, there’s a place to be challenged, certainly but especially early in that journey, you know, the momentum that you’re sustaining. You talked about, you know, the hustle mentality, the energy that you’re going to need to sustain that to see through the vision and the idea that you have, so important, especially early on in the journey.

Let’s talk about your experience on Gordon Ramsay’s Food Stars. What an incredible opportunity, and for those that are listening that are not familiar with the show, can you just give us a quick, general premise of what that show is all about?

[0:18:22.0] LH: Yes. So, Gordon Ramsay’s food stars, it is his brand new show, season one. It’s on FOX but essentially, he invited 15 of the most promising food and beverage entrepreneurs to compete for USD 250,000 of his angel investment, yeah.

[0:18:41.2] TU: And the 15, one thing I was wondering and maybe this was mentioned early in the show and I missed it but how did you get selected as one of those 15, was there an audition process or what did that look like?

[0:18:53.3] LH: So, me, personally they reached out to me on Instagram.

[0:18:56.2] TU: Oh, cool.

[0:18:56.8] LH: So, I got recruited to be on the show and there’s a casting director who reached out and said, “Hey, let me know if you’d be interested in this show. I think you’ll be a good fit.” And so, I – you know, for me, I thought it was fake news from the beginning. I like literally went to Gordon Ramsay’s Instagram and saw that he was promoting the show as well. So, that’s when I knew it was legit.

So, there is – you know, there was an application, you know, kind of on the Internet that you could go and apply. I think only one person out of the entire cast actually applied and got the position – or you know, got on the show. Everyone else was recruited.

[0:19:34.1] TU: Okay, that was cool. I was wondering about the process to get there and we’re not going to spill all of what happened, we’re going to make people go watch it if they haven’t watched it. We’ll just say that you were in the final three, we’ll leave it at that. One of the things I’m really curious about is you know, what you see on TV and obviously the thing that you experienced, I know those are two very, very different things.

And you know I’m curious, as you reflect back on that experience, what are one or two things that really stand out to you? Of things that you look back and say, “Wow, because of that experience, I learned this about myself.” What really were some of the takeaways that you had from that show?

[0:20:10.6] LH: Yeah. One of the biggest things that people tell me that I – maybe I didn’t know about me, I mean, I really didn’t know this about myself was how poised I am, right? That is probably – so, I learned a lot about myself based on how other people perceive me and that was like, probably the number one feedback when people would DM me, comment on my Instagram, Facebook, send me messages, emails, everything, they were just like, “We’re such a big fan of you, we felt like you, you know, held it together, you’re very professional, very poised.”

And then, you’re just like, “Wow, I didn’t know that I actually am like that” you know? So, you start to kind of think like, “You know, this is how I present myself and unknowingly, how people see in business, right?” So, that was kind of something that I learned about myself just being on TV and I think, another thing is that you have to take risks, right? I remember when they reached out to me, I had no intention on being on television, and I may have unlocked some other opportunities because of that.

But I remember telling myself, “Look, if you’re going to do this Fat Miilk thing and you’re going to build this to be what, you know, a global company or whatever, the potential you think it is, you have to go out there and put it all on the line.” You have to take that risk, right? And I remember telling myself that this is what it takes when you want to turn that big corner in your career, your life, whatever it is that you’re doing, you got to go out swinging and you have to be able to step up to it when that opportunity comes along and that was not only evident in some of the challenges on the show where I really took up space, right?

[0:21:53.0] TU: Yes.

[0:21:54.3] LH: This was going on the show in it of itself once an example of that and I think sometimes, a lot of entrepreneurs probably – maybe they reach out to so many people seeing if, “Hey, do you want to go on the show, do you want to do this?” And a lot of people are like, “Oh no, me on television? No.” You know?

And so, a lot of people, I think a lot of businesses probably turned that opportunity down, you know? And I think for me, the biggest thing was it does pay off when you not only stay prepared but you are prepared and you’re willing to flex that preparation, you know? Because I had one month to leave my life in Chicago and go to LA to film this thing and that’s exactly what happened and made it all the way to the finale like you said. So, I mean, you know it paid off.

[0:22:41.7] TU: Yeah, and I think just saying yes to that opportunity, you know, I think sometimes we see those opportunities, we’re like, “Oh, it would be so nice, right? If I had that kind of break.” But I think you’re point is a really good one. You have to have a willingness to say yes, you entered into an unknown territory. I’m sure there are fears and anxieties, you know, surrounding that, and just what you shared in the wisdom of taking up space, right? 

I think a lot of entrepreneurs struggle with that, I would say, pharmacists, entrepreneurs, you would struggle more, which is that concept of taking up space not only by being on the show but then, within, you know, the show and the interactions, making sure that you’re taking up the space that you need as well to grow and hopefully, you know, there’s a promotion, there’s other opportunities.

But what I’m also hearing from you which I love is the personal growth that happened to the experience because I firmly believe that often, the ceiling, how high, how far a business can go is directly correlated to the mindset of the leader of that organization, which is you, the founder, and the CEO, and what I’m hearing is this vast expansion of the mindset of what you believe is possible and where you can take this brand and where you could take this business, so I love that. 

I recall Lan, one of the experts and I can’t remember his name, I think he was from maybe Albertsons, Wholefoods, you can point me back in the right direction that I would say he was somewhat critical of the branding and the disconnect that he was seeing in terms of the coffee and the product being in a carton, maybe somewhat around the naming as well. 

So, refresh us on what happened there, and then I’m just curious as you reflect back on that, how did you take that feedback in the moment, and then what have you done or what have you processed since that feedback as well? 

[0:24:25.4] LH: Yeah, absolutely. So, in the finale, you know Gordon Ramsay brought on two experts, both of them very well-versed in retail distribution and CPG, right? And so, one of the biggest feedback that I got was the confusion of our coffee beans being in a milk carton and the name of the company being Fat Miilk. I will say this is nothing I don’t already know, right? In the case that I launched the company in 2020 and we did so many pop-ups. 

I mean, we did pop-ups all over Chicago. I mean, anywhere and everywhere, you know, gyms, Chinese restaurants, parks, everywhere. I mean, and we got all of that feedback, right? And people would say the same things you know? And I definitely took all of that into consideration and a lot of people don’t know that when I was filming for the show, I was already looking to address those concerns and I was also negotiating the lease for our first storefront, right? 

So, I was doing all of that because we all are there and we all have businesses, that’s the whole premise of the show is that we’re all entrepreneurs. We’re all still working on our business, we still have to keep the business afloat while we’re filming for this show in full anxiety mode. I mean, it was like a whole flex from mental, emotional, everything, physical, and I will say you know, those were – it was definitely confirming when he gave me that feedback that this was definitely something that we needed to address. 

And so when I came back from the show, you know I found my dream creative agency who was going to help me rebrand the entire business, right? And I am someone that has incredible intentionality maybe to a detriment sometimes, you know? I want to understand every decision we make with intention, like if someone tells me, “Oh, these are our brand colors” I want to know why.

[0:26:19.5] TU: Yep. 

[0:26:19.8] LH: You know, like it has to have a reason, it has to have some kind of intention as to why you made that decision and it can’t just be because you like it. In my opinion, you’re missing out in a huge opportunity, right? And so a lot of people don’t know that you know, I named the company Fat Miilk because when people think of Vietnamese coffee, the most popular way to consume Vietnamese coffee is with a little bit of sweetened condensed milk, right? 

And so when people say, “Oh, have you had Vietnamese coffee before?” they’re like, “Oh, yeah. I don’t like it, it’s too sweet” or it’s like, “Oh yeah, I do love it. It’s sweet and this and this and that” and I’m like that’s just one version to enjoy Vietnamese coffee but Vietnamese coffee is just beans from Vietnam, right? And it is a very bold nutty chocolatey two times the caffeine content type of bean that when you add a little bit of sweetened condensed milk to it, it just is the perfect balance. 

So, when I named the company Fat Miilk, not only do we intend to do some exciting things with condensed milk but also I get to educate people like, “Look, the reason why it’s called Fat Miilk is because you probably think sweetened condensed milk equates to Vietnamese coffee, right? But let me tell you why it’s not” and so I need to educate consumers and tell a broader story as to why Vietnamese coffee is what it is. 

And so when I came back from the show and hired on Truffl, they’re an amazing creative agency out in LA, I had them challenge me on every single decision I have made up into that point, right? And I said, “Challenge me, why did I name it Fat Miilk? Why is the logo a water buffalo? Why the colors, why the milk carton, why this, why that?” And if I didn’t have a good answer for that now we needed to come up with the solution, you know? 

And so yeah, and so you know, we’re about to launch our Fat Miilk 2.0 is what I call it because I had a huge opportunity and a huge blessing to kind of redirect this whole brand in a way where now it’s viable to scale. It’s really good logistically, you know when it comes to complexity. You know just the packaging itself, it’s ready to grow, and just use all of that feedback over the last couple of years now put the company in a position to really play in the category. 

[0:28:37.8] TU: Yeah, and what I love about that, my takeaway there is your openness and receptiveness to be challenged, right? I think so often especially as a founder, right? It’s your baby, it’s your product and there’s moments where we have to set ego aside, right? And acknowledge and recognize like, “Hey, we’ve done an awesome job of getting the product to this point. I started this literally from an idea to a product that people are willing to pay for.” 

That is an amazing accomplishment, an amazing accomplishment, and then to say, “Okay, next level” you talked about you know, hiring an agency. You obviously have input and feedback and you know, it sounds like there is some consumer research going on there, probably formal and informal, and then to go work with an agency and say, “Hey, challenge me, challenge me on everything that I’ve done” and not in a egotistical, “I’m going to tell you why.” 

But in a, “I’m going to make sure that this is the best product that it can be and if there is a way that we can make this better I’m open, I’m receptive to that” and that is beautiful and that is hard to do, very hard to do. 

[0:29:40.9] LH: It is. It is and let me tell you, when I made the decision everyone was against me. My fractional CFO was against me, my team was totally against it. They were just like, “No Lan, we love it, we love the water buffalo, we love the carton, and look, it was a success in the sense that it got the attention of Gordon Ramsay.” You know, if you watch the finale, our old brand is plastered all over our pop-up and you know, that episode. 

And so like, it is beautiful but when you think about it from a business perspective, it didn’t put us in a position to really play, right? It was complicated, it was confusing, it was so many things, and so I will say you know, everyone was pushing against me to keep it the way that things were and I had to challenge everyone and be like, “Look, I’m making this decision. We need to address these issues because if we expand and we’re in Iowa and Nebraska, are we going to be able to it on the show and have and communicate exactly who we are as a brand and without us being there?” 

“If I can’t say that with our current brand though, we need to make some changes” and there were days, there were days, let me tell you, where I was genuinely depressed. Like I remember when we made the decision to nix our logo, which is a water buffalo, the national animal of Vietnam but it has no relevance to coffee because coffee is not grown in the water, by the way, that was a really dark day for me. 

Because I was like, “What have I been doing this whole time?” Like you know, I feel like I’ve built this brand, people really love it, they resonate with the water buffalo, it kind of looks like the Chicago Bulls, you know with the [inaudible 0:31:24.0] It was this whole thing and people were genuinely sad about it and I was sad about it and I had to stick to my gut and be like, “We’re letting it go.” 

[0:31:33.6] TU: Yeah, yeah. 

[0:31:34.1] LH: It’s not going to be our logo anymore, you know? And so that was really hard for me during the rebrand but I stand by what it looks like now and I know it can go the distance. 

[0:31:44.3] TU: Well, and that’s the key, go the distance, right? I mean, I think what you’re talking about there the vision, you know I think about me as a consumer in Columbus, Ohio going to the coffee shelf like that’s what you’re talking about next level, right? 

[0:31:54.5] LH: Yes. 

[0:31:54.9] TU: You are not talking about your inner circle or people that are you know, attached to the brand and from Jump Street and there’s risk in any one of those decisions obviously but you know, I think that you’re talking about, “Hey, how do I take this to the next level?” and the bigger vision that you can see, so much there to takeaway as you shared that. 

[0:32:14.2] LH: Yes. 

[0:32:15.0] TU: Let me go – I want to share with our listeners and talk about the timeline of what you’ve built because it’s really incredible in a short period of time. 

[0:32:22.1] LH: Thank you. 

[0:32:23.0] TU: So, April 2019, you incorporated, you got the trademark in July 2020, you are furloughed from your pharmacy job. September 2020, just two months after that furlough, you launched Fat Miilk as a brand, December 2020 you secured wholesale partnerships. April 2022, season one of Ramsay, Gordon Ramsay’s food show starts. August 2022, lease signed for the storefront, we’ll talk about that here in a moment. August 2023, you launched Kickstart. 

I mean, we’re talking about a very brief period of time where a lot was happening and if I am following correctly, you were furloughed from your pharmacy job and that really accelerated the growth of your business but the idea had been around prior to that furlough. Am I following that correctly? 

[0:33:06.1] LH: One hundred percent. 

[0:33:07.0] TU: Okay. 

[0:33:07.6] LH: Yes. 

[0:33:08.3] TU: Awesome and you – 

[0:33:08.9] LH: That some people will say – just to quickly plug in there, people say, “How did you launch this company in two months?” It’s like I’ve been conceptualizing, which is the longest part by the way, when you’re thinking about how you’re going to do it, what it’s going to look like, and execute. I’ve been doing that for years, you know? And so when it came to the opportunity to actually put it in motion, that’s how we were able to launch in two months. 

Business, you know what I mean but like if I just thought about this in two months and launched it, I mean, that is – I just want to make that clear that you know, this was something that was brewing for a while. 

[0:33:41.2] TU: Do you think you would have pursued this regardless if the furlough happened? Would it have just been a delayed timeline? I’m curious to hear your reflection back on how much of the furlough was an accelerator or an initiator or you know, if you would have grown in that role or maybe pursued a fellowship industry pathway. Like is there a place where this idea maybe never sees the light of day or it would have just been maybe a little bit more down the road? 

[0:34:08.9] LH: Yeah, Fat Miilk was 100% going to happen. Yes, so 100%. I will say that furlough was the biggest blessing in my life because I told myself, “You know, once I get to this point I’m going to quit and go all in on Fat Miilk” and then that timeline started to get pushed back. “Once I get here, you know? I’m going to do that” and so that furlough was just like I took that as the sign, the universe telling me it is time to go, you know? 

And so, I think when I got furloughed I didn’t have a choice. It was I was furloughed, you know I had no choice but to make my dream come true as opposed to like go and look for another pharmacy job, you know? So that was a big sign for me and I ran with it. I saw that opportunity and I’m like, “This is it. This is the world telling me you need to go and do this” and so when they asked me to come back two months later I said, “No, I already launched it.” I already launched the company, so I’m just going to focus on this now, yeah. 

[0:35:08.1] TU: Lan, I’m curious as you think about all the different aspects involved in starting and growing a business, running a business, right? Marketing, sales, building a team, culture of the company, finances, distribution, supply chain management, when you think about all of the different pieces that you’ve been involved, what has been the area that’s had the biggest learning curve and growth for you over the past few years? 

[0:35:32.8] LH: Yeah, it’s a good question because I think everything has been a learning curve. I will say, just to transition from going from a very regulated structure and lifestyle with not only being a student in higher education for 10 years but then going into pharmacy to then going into entrepreneurship, that has always and still is a very big challenge in my life, right? I think when you transition from you know, going from a corporate structure into anything on your own, you are the corporate structure and a lot of people don’t know that, you know? 

They’re just like, “Wait, what am I supposed to do, you know?” Like you’ve been told, you know, I’ve been told exactly how my seasons look. You know, you have your fall semester, you have your spring semester, you have summer break, you know? And then from there, when you go to work, you have your schedule, you have your shifts, you have your you know, things that you know you can and cannot do, especially a very regulated industry like pharmacy. 

There is no creative flexes in there and so when I went from my entire life of living in structure to then going on and starting my own business, I had to wake up every day and sometimes I didn’t know what to do. It’s like, “Wait, you have so many things you need to do” and you have so many things you need to learn and you don’t actually know where you put your time and energy into what is going to convert for you the most. 

So, it’s so much trial and error in just learning, learning how to prioritize your days and sometimes, you don’t even move the needle an inch, right? Because you’re just like, “Okay, well, I guess I realize you know focusing on this email newsletter or what” you know, trying to cold call a bunch of other brands, it didn’t go anywhere but you have to keep trying and see and I think even until this moment, you know I still have to segment and learn that structure in my day that I thrived in corporate culture to then apply that to my own life. 

And being able to deliver and execute for my team and for the future and grow Fat Miilk and like you said earlier, you are your biggest asset to your company, you know? Like truly how you operate and how you structure your days and if you feel good about that day, you feel productive about how you structured that day, all of that is such a big influence in how your company ends up doing, right? 

And so, I always say like you, the only person that’s getting in the way is me, you know? I feel like I can teach it to myself, I can teach myself supply chain and customs and importing beans and all of these things but if I am not feeling it that day, that ultimately is my business is going to take a hit, you know? It’s like now you have to learn discipline to a T and that is the hardest thing. 

[0:38:24.6] TU: Yeah and I think to give yourself some grace like you know, you gave the example of like you can spend a day making cold calls or working on the newsletter and you’re like, “Hey, I thought that was going to be a high impact priority day where me as the founder and the CEO can move the needle most” and sometimes it’s not or you say, “Okay, that work, that didn’t work. Now, I’m going to bob, now I’m going to shift.” 

But giving yourself some grace in those moments of, “Yeah, maybe I didn’t tangibly move forward the business today but I learned something and I learned that hey, this doesn’t work or I’ve got to iterate” and you know I think sometimes, you know the wins need to be reveled in and enjoyed and celebrated but also there are those days, there are the seasons, there are the weeks where you’re grinding or you’re like, “I don’t even know where to start on the list of things to be done.” 

And like those moments, those seasons, those days are going to happen. They’re just going to happen and you know I think to recognize them and obviously, you’re speaking from experience there, it’s so important to give yourself grace in that season. 

[0:39:20.0] LH: Yes, that’s real. It’s real. 

[0:39:22.9] TU: As you think about the future of Fat Miilk, you’ve mentioned Fat Miilk 2.0 a couple of times, you mentioned at least once or twice getting ready to open a storefront. Tell us about what’s next for Fat Miilk in this 2.0 iteration and where you see the brand going here over the next couple of years. 

[0:39:39.8] LH: Yeah, absolutely. You know, we’re such at a pivotal time in the company right now in the sense that we had an opportunity to really restart the brand and do it with intention. A lot of brands don’t get to do that and not only that but we just had raising credibility from the Gordon Ramsay show, right? And so I’m really adopting this clicks and bricks business model. You know, if you look at businesses like Warby Parker and Outlaw, you know you have – they have their online presence but they also have this in-person on-the-ground brand experience, right? 

And I think that is so necessary for an emerging market and so, you’ll be seeing a lot of us double downing on our digital footprint but also expanding our community outreach, right? Through different storefronts throughout Chicago and expanding to major cities but also what’s really important to me is approaching Fat Miilk with the utmost respect for the farmers and the coffee industry, right? 

And if – you know, I don’t want to bore people with the history here but you know, just due to climate change, the Robusta bean is actually going to be the biggest shift in consumer just brands in general when it comes to coffee and what is going to be readily available, right? And so we have an opportunity to really be a huge player in the impact of climate change and I’m really looking into upcycling every single layer of the coffee bean itself because a lot of people don’t know what’s a cherry. 

So, there is a fruit around it and the seed in the middle is the actual coffee bean and so I’m working with farmers right now to see how we can upcycle parts of the pulp and the skin of the cherry to use in some of our other verticals and that’s been really exciting for me and maybe that’s the compounding part of pharmacy that I really enjoy and being able to take something and make something new out of it. 

So, that’s kind of the approach for Fat Miilk moving forward is having consumer experience in multiple channels but also doing something with the coffee cherry itself and having an impact on just the industry. 

[0:41:55.0] TU: And I think that connects so well to your strength that you talked about, you know, towards the beginning of the episode, which is your strength around the branding, the marketing, the creative side, the storytelling, right? Bringing the cup of coffee to individuals as an experience and I think we’ve come a long way as a consumer but I would argue we have more to go and you are obviously tapping into that. 

That you know, I think people, some people maybe just want a cup of coffee every morning they want to think about it but I think there is a big market of people that are very interested in where is this bean coming from and what is you know, the story of the farm, what is the story of the roaster and you know, how can this really come to be an experience and not just something that’s a functional part of the day that I don’t really think a whole lot about, right? 

[0:42:38.2] LH: Yeah, I absolutely agree, and I think a small part of people, I will say a minority group of people really, really geek out about that stuff but I think there is an opportunity for you know, mass appeal for people to care about that stuff. 

[0:42:52.8] TU: I agree. 

[0:42:53.2] LH: You have to do it, you have to do it with lifestyle. You have to do it where it’s a party and not a protest, right? Because climate change can very easily go into this protest mode, right? Where we’re not doing things right, we’re contributing to it like you know? And kind of playing this blame game but if you can create a brand where people just really resonate with you know, the packaging and what you’re doing.

The vibes you’re giving off, they naturally are inclined to care more about why you exist, and that is the approach that I am taking. I think a lot of brands go so far right or one way or the other about you know, going deep into climate change, going top of really, really using these big words and things that people get really bored about when it comes to the impact of the pulp and you know, just the coffee production and how that can impact just the industry and the you know, the world. 

And so, I think the best people to do it are brands who have a way to engage customers without them actually even knowing that they’re engaged. 

[0:43:58.1] TU: That is fantastic and this has been a real treat. I am so grateful for you coming on the show and sharing your journey and I’m really excited to follow what’s ahead. I have a feeling you’re just getting warmed up here. So, where is the best place that our listeners can go to follow your journey and learn more about what you’re building? 

[0:44:15.1] LH: Yeah, absolutely. We’re pretty active on social media. So, it’s you know Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, all of that is @fatmiilk with two Is, so Fat Miilk. The best place to just get our coffee, experience the brand, we’ll always be fatmiilk.com, and then for people who are in Chicago or visiting Chicago, we are building up our Chicago flagship storefront and that is in uptown at the corner of Broadway and Arga. 

[0:44:42.4] TU: Awesome. Well, thank you so much again and when you decide to expand into Columbus, Ohio you have to let me know, Lan. 

[0:44:48.7] LH: Absolutely. 

[0:44:49.5] TU: Great market here as well but in all seriousness, thank you so much for coming on the show. 

[0:44:53.6] LH: Yes, I appreciate it. Thanks for having me. 

[END OF INTERVIEW]

[0:44:56.1] JW: Hey, this is Justin again from the YFP Team. Thanks for tuning in to today’s podcast. If you’re a pharmacy professional, you know how crucial it is to have access to reliable drug information. That’s why we’re excited to tell you about Pyrls, today’s podcast sponsor. Gone are the days spending hundreds of dollars for access to drug information. Pyrls offers top drug summaries, clinical teaching points, a drug interaction checker, calculators, and guideline reviews, all in one user-friendly resource.

Whether you prefer accessing information through your web browser, Chrome extension, or mobile app, Pyrls has got you covered. Plus, for a limited time, you can visit pyrls.com to get access to more than 25 free Pharmacotherapy charts to get you started. Upgrade your drug information resources today with Pyrls, visit pyrls.com, that’s P-Y-R-L-S.com, to learn more. Thanks again for listening. 

[DISCLAIMER]

[0:45:50.3] TU: As we conclude this week’s podcast, an important reminder that the content on this show is provided to you for informational purposes only and it is not intended to provide and should not be relied on for investment or any other advice. Information on the podcast and corresponding materials should not be construed as a solicitation or offer to buy or sell any investment or related financial products. We urge listeners to consult with a financial advisor with respect to any investment. 

Furthermore, the information contained in our archived newsletters, blog posts, and podcasts is not updated and may not be accurate at the time you listen to it on the podcast. Opinions and analyses expressed herein are solely those of Your Financial Pharmacist unless otherwise noted and constitute judgments as of the dates published. Such information may contain forward-looking statements, which are not intended to be guarantees of future events. Actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements. For more information, please visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/disclaimer. 

Thank you again for your support of the Your Financial Pharmacist Podcast. Have a great rest of your week.

[END]

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YFP 331: How One Couple Paid Off $208k of Student Loans


On this episode, Jackie Boyle, PharmD, MBA and Paul Boyle share their journey paying off $208k of student loans.

Episode Summary

Debt can be an overwhelming weight on one’s shoulders, but imagine paying off an astounding $208,000 of it! This week on the podcast, we are joined by the inspirational duo, Jackie and Paul Boyle. They recount their journey from being neck-deep in student loans to paying them off entirely. This episode delves into their personal and collective strategies, their highs and lows, the financial compromises made, and how they kept the momentum to reach the finish line. From Paul’s decision to be a stay-at-home dad to Jackie’s reflections on missed opportunities with the PSLF program, their experiences provide invaluable insights for anyone navigating their own debt repayment process. We also dive into the emotional and financial challenges they encountered, especially when transitioning to a single-income household. Yet, their story isn’t just about the hurdles; it’s brimming with actionable takeaways and advice for those on similar paths. As Paul and Jackie demonstrate, with determination, strategic financial planning, and mutual support, even the heftiest of student loans can be overcome. So whether you’re struggling with student loans, seeking motivation, or just curious about the Boyles’ debt-free journey, this episode is a must-listen. Join us and discover how you too can rewrite your financial story!

About Today’s Guest

Jackie Boyle is a pharmacy educator by day and coaches pharmacists and pharmacies in a part-time capacity. She received her Doctor of Pharmacy from Northeast Ohio Medical University in 2012, MBA from University of Findlay in 2016, and Master and Bachelor degrees from THE Ohio State University (O-H!) She is highly involved in professional organizations including ASHP and AACP, and also loves spending time with her husband and two daughters, Gianna and Giulia. In her free time, she loves spinning, yoga, and enjoying a warm cup of coffee.

Paul Boyle is a Client Service Associate out of the Cleveland, Ohio area where he has had a diverse career of over 20 years, mostly taking care of customers and clients in various fields of service ranging from manufacturing to professional baseball. He received a Bachelor’s degree in Sport Management from The University of Akron in 2020, while taking time away from the workforce to raise his children. Paul spends most of his free time with his wife, Jackie, and two daughters, Gianna and Giulia. An avid Cleveland sports fan, musician and aspiring podcaster. When not supporting his local teams he likes to enjoy the occasional motorcycle ride, which is another longtime passion.

Key Points From the Episode

  • Get to know Jackie and Paul, and their student loan debt repayment journey.
  • The shared decision for Paul to be a stay-at-home dad and finish his degree.
  • A reminder that you can make mistakes and still achieve your debt repayment goals.
  • The extensive student loan debt that Paul inherited when he married Jackie.
  • Having a baby and becoming a single-income household.
  • How the emotional weight of student loans shifted throughout their debt journey.
  • Why Paul always maintained confidence in their plan and abilities.
  • Jackie’s income-based debt repayment strategy during her residency.
  • Her biggest regret: not using the PSLF program.
  • The challenge of staying motivated during an aggressive repayment journey.
  • How Jackie and Paul maintained momentum.
  • The value of budgeting and breaking repayment down into smaller goals.
  • Why everyone’s debt repayment journey is different.
  • Finding the right balance between debt repayment and investing in the future.
  • How to assess your priorities and allocate your finances.
  • Using your side hustle to pay for additional expenses.
  • Refinancing your student loans and taking advantage of lower interest rates.
  • Advice for new graduates as interest on student loans returns after the pandemic freeze.
  • What’s next for Jackie and Paul now that they have their student loans behind them.

Episode Highlights

“We ended up paying off earlier than I anticipated due to some choices we’ve made. So, yes, it’s very exciting to be on this journey. That said, I know we definitely made mistakes as well.” — Jackie Boyle [0:05:27]

“I never thought inheriting this much debt comes with the territory of a relationship. So that was all brand new.” — Paul Boyle [0:07:57]

“I was so engulfed in residency life that, honestly, [repaying my debt] took a back burner. I should have been doing things way differently during that time.” — Jackie Boyle [0:09:30]

“If you look at that big number, you could be paralyzed by it. But if you look at those smaller numbers, it’s like, ‘okay, over the course of the next three months, I can achieve this goal, and I know how I’m going to achieve it.’” — Jackie Boyle [0:12:49]

“We never felt strapped or that we had to eat ramen for the next couple [of] years to achieve this. That made things better, and that’s motivating in its own [right]. You could see, ‘Hey, we’re doing great.’ We could keep this up as we’re going.” — Paul Boyle [0:15:52]

“Educate yourself. Find a mentor or a financial planner to work with. Get a budget in line. Those basic tools can be really helpful in giving you the motivation to realize that you can do this with a better understanding of your own personal situation and what’s possible.” — Jackie Boyle [0:26:26]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode

Episode Transcript

[INTRODUCTION]

[00:00:00] TU: Hey, everybody. Tim Ulbrich here, and thank you for listening to the YFP Podcast, where each week we strive to inspire and encourage you on your path towards achieving financial freedom. 

This week, I welcome Jackie and Paul Boyle as they share their journey of paying off $208,000 of student loans. We discussed the motivations behind their debt-free journey, how they balanced debt repayment with other financial goals, including investing and buying a home, lessons they learned along the way, strategies they employed to get on the same page, and advice that they have for those that are navigating loan repayment. 

Okay, let’s hear a brief message from YFP team member, Justin Woods, and then we’ll hit play on Jackie and Paul Boyle’s debt-free story. 

[00:00:40] JW: Hey, Your Financial Pharmacist community. This is Justin Woods here, Director of Business Development at YFP. You may be one of the 13,000 pharmacists that have already signed up for YFP Money Matters, which is our weekly newsletter. But if you’re not, what are you waiting for? I want to invite you to subscribe. We send financial tips, recommendations, the latest podcast episode and money resources, all specifically for pharmacists. It all comes straight to your inbox every Friday morning. So visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/newsletter, or click the link in the show notes to subscribe today. Again, that’s yourfinancialpharmacist.com/newsletter. See you there. 

[INTERVIEW]

[00:01:25] TU: Jackie and Paul, welcome to the show. 

[00:01:27] JB: Hello. 

[00:01:28] PB: Hey, Tim. 

[00:01:29] TU: Well, this is a real treat for me. Many of your listeners may not know. Paul, you are a member of the YFP team, and so we’ve had the opportunity to work with one another here over the last several months. We’re incredibly grateful to have you as a part of the team. 

Jackie, you and I have known each other. It’s got to be well over a decade, I think, at this point. I used to be on faculty at NEOMED way back when, and you started there as a student and then a resident. Then we were colleagues. You’re continuing to do great work there, and we’ll talk more about that here in a moment. 

So this is a treat to be able to have both of you on as friends, as well as to share with our community your debt-free story. So congratulations to both of you and excited to dig into a little bit of what went behind that, how much debt you paid off, what were the motivations, what worked, what didn’t work, and what lies ahead for you guys now that you’ve got this big milestone achieved. 

Paul, let’s start with you. Tell us a little bit more about your background, your career, and the work that you’re doing now. 

[00:02:26] PB: Yes. So like you mentioned, I am part of the YFP team now as a client service associate. Love my job. Love the people I work with. It’s great to be a part of this community. But before that, my last paid job was with a company called Lincoln Electric, and I was a warranty service rep there in my last position. So still kind of helping customers out in that realm. But I chose to – well, we as a family made a decision when we had our first daughter that we wanted one of us to stay at home. 

So me being the lesser income earner and with this topic, it’s student debt, we decided that my wife was going to continue to work and that I was going to be a stay-at-home dad. I used that time to go back to school, finish my degree in sports management and, yes, never looked back. Since then enjoyed the time with my kids. Being a stay-at-home dad was probably the best job that I’ve ever had so. 

[00:03:23] TU: That’s awesome. Jackie, I just scratched the surface on my mention of your training at NEOMED and your residency and your faculty role. But tell us more about your pharmacy journey. What led you into the profession, including the work that you’re doing now?

[00:03:36] JB: Oh, thank you, Tim. This is such an exciting thing to be on your podcast, Tim. My relationship has gone on for so many years and so many different capacities. So I’m just so excited to be talking with you here today. My background is a bit of a mix of ambulatory care practice and education. So I started out my career in practice-based faculty roles and a few different settings in ambulatory care and then actually took a full-time position at the college at Northeast Ohio Medical University here in 2019. So I’ve been here for the past four years. 

Around 2017, though, I started getting a little bit of an entrepreneurial itch. Of course, as Tim is one of my greatest mentors, I started talking with him about ideas for part-time work and actually got connected to an awesome entrepreneur, Alex Barker, who was starting a career coaching company at the time and have been career and business coaching pharmacists now for about six years, which plays into our story as well. It’s just been a ton of fun. 

So, yes, a little bit of a few different things. I love being a jack of all trades and kind of exploring what’s out there in pharmacy. So, yes, this journey has been a long one, but I hope that we could share some of our mistakes, some of our wins, maybe inspire a few people along the way. 

[00:04:59] TU: So, Jackie, let’s start with the juicy details around the student loans. How much did you end up paying off between the two of you when it was all said and done? 

[00:05:09] JB: Yes. I think it was about $208,000. As the CFO of our family, I was keenly keeping an eye on our balances as they went down over time. It’s awesome to think back now how much we started with and where we ended up. We ended up paying off earlier than I anticipated due to some choices we’ve made. So, yes, it’s very exciting to be on this journey. That said, I know we definitely made mistakes as well, and I wish – for example, like PSLF. I probably could have taken advantage of that, but I didn’t even know that was a thing. So I’m here to say that you can make mistakes and still achieve the goal eventually as well. 

[00:05:53] TU: Yes. That’s such a good reminder, Jackie. I think there’s so much pressure around this decision. We have the opportunity to talk with pharmacy students, new grads on a regular basis. We talk about the importance of really understanding these loan repayment options and getting that decision that’s best for your personal situation. I think that can feel weighty at times, right? Because it can have big implications, whether it’s a PSLF strategy or another strategy. 

But, also, what you shared, I think, is such an important reminder is that mistakes are inevitable part of the financial plan. It’s going to happen. They happen on the regular and giving ourselves some grace and learning from those mistakes. We’re not always going to get it according to the textbook, and that’s okay, right? That’s part of this journey is to learn as well. 

Paul, I want to start with you but really a question for both of you. As you think about your journey and the student loans, did your feelings around the student loans change over time? Some people we talk with, when I say give me the 0 to 10 student loan pain scale, where zero is the – no. They are what they are. They’re going to take care of themselves. Ten is the house is on fire, right? No right or wrong answer, but everyone is different on that journey. I’m just curious. Like for you, did that change at all along your journey, right? As you guys grew in terms of a family and your careers, tell us more about the emotions and feelings around the student loan debt. 

[00:07:21] PB: Yes, absolutely. It’s intimidating for me at the beginning because when Jackie and I met, she had just graduated. So she went into residency. As everybody knows out there, residency pay is not quite the same as full pharmacist pay. But I was working full-time at the time, too. But just realizing like the massive amount of that compared to mine, I think what Jackie – I don’t know how much mine was at the time. I only had a couple thousand left to pay off on mine, and we paid it off first. 

But kind of we got engaged, and I was like okay. I never thought like inheriting this much debt like comes with the territory of a relationship. So that was all kind of brand new. 

[00:08:04] JB: I came with a lot of baggage. 

[00:08:06] PB: Yes. It’s not bad baggage, but it’s just something that you never thought you had to plan for, right? So before even like our wedding and taking on a mortgage and stuff like that, here’s this amount of debt that amounts to a house. I think I took it pretty seriously, but I don’t think I felt like it was a pain point quite yet because, again, we were both working full-time. We figured, okay, we could come up with a plan to handle this. 

But as it progressed and as I left work and we became a single-income household, it kind of went up there to like a seven or an eight maybe, just because of that weight like of all that debt, and like will we get there, and then we started a family and added expenses and stuff. So I wouldn’t say I lost sleep over it because I had kind of confidence in especially Jackie as our CFO and her earning potential that we could kind of navigate it. 

[00:09:03] JB: Yes. I think, for me, I was in denial for the first two years. So during residency, I did income-based repayment, which meant that my monthly payments were zero. But the interest was accumulating rapidly, as you all know. So those first two years, I should have been at a seven or eight. But I was at like a zero to one because I’m like, “Oh, this is not – it’s not a problem right now. I don’t need to be paying attention to it.” I was so engulfed in residency life that, honestly, it took a back burner. I should have been doing things way differently during that time. 

Like Paul said, during like the year of our engagement and then leading up to marriage and our first child, that’s when it became more of like a house on fire seven or eight-plus for me. I was so determined to start attacking this thing. Once I realized that I should have been doing things way differently, and I had already made a few big mistakes with not going to the PSLF program. So, yes, definitely changed for me over time and perhaps that denial factor didn’t help us for the first two years. 

[00:10:07] PB: It was kind of out of sight, out of mind type of thing. We had, like I said, paid off mine, and we’re like, “Oh, hey. That’s a great feeling.” So we kind of did in our minds know, hey, with us, with the DINK lifestyle, right? Like we can kind of tackle some of these other debts that we had, and I knew Jackie wasn’t a fan of debt to begin with. So we had a couple small wins there. But still, like I wasn’t thinking about the big one quite yet. 

[00:10:37] TU: Jackie, remind me. Year of residency completed was what?

[00:10:42] JB: So two years and it was done in 2014. 

[00:10:45] TU: 2014. Okay. So when we think about that journey, 2014, obviously, you mentioned the income-based repayment. Paul, you mentioned your loan. But 2014 to 2023, that’s a period of time where you’re waiting through this. You’ve got a young family. Other expenses are creeping up. Many of our listeners can relate to this feeling. Momentum can be very hard to sustain for a long period of time, right? We had a pharmacist on recently that paid off a little over $345,000 of debt in five years. Very, very aggressive repayment journey. I asked her the same question I’m going to ask you, which is when you think about paying off over $200,000 of debt over a sustained period of time, it’s hard to keep the motivation and the momentum going. 

For you, Jackie, let’s start with you. For the two of you, for your family, like how were you able to keep that momentum and motivation going? What was the why that was fueling you guys as you were trying to really make sure you persisted through this over that period of time?

[00:11:47] JB: Well, before starting to dive into financial topics, our one session about this topic, student loans, was the last day of our P4 year. We had an hour-and-a-half session about what our debt was, our repayment options. Again, it was just so overwhelming at that time that it got shoved back away. Once we got oriented towards like what our life goals were and that we wanted to not only gain financial freedom but set up our kids for success, be able to do things like giving, pay off things as quickly as possible, then I think breaking it down into smaller goals was the only way that it felt achievable. 

I actually started writing down small goals every morning in the increments of like $5,000 to say, okay, if I can get the loan balance under this, like I’ve achieved another goal. As achievement-oriented person, like that felt really good to do. It might sound silly, but it also made the overall goal feel manageable because if you look at that big number, you could be paralyzed by it. But if you look at those smaller numbers, it’s like, okay, over the course of the next three months, I can achieve this goal, and I know how I’m going to achieve it. 

I think the other helpful thing we started doing once we got married was to start budgeting and just to even have a handle around what are our finances, what our expenses, how much money do we have left over at the end of the month that’s not left with a purpose, and starting to really allocate like, okay, where are all of our dollars going. Where does this extra money contribute to the financial plan or not? 

Thankfully, with all the resources that your team has developed, Tim, and all the education you were providing, we were able to start learning about different options, different ideas, how we can start tackling it. 

[00:13:37] TU: A couple things I heard there which are really good. You mentioned, obviously, the budget being an important part for the two of you. I suggest if you are like most couples, right? Budgeting is a process that takes time to make sure that you’re in alignment with the bigger vision and the goals. But such an important part of, hey, this is the shared vision that we have for our financial plan. I think that was really key. 

The other thing you mentioned which I thought is really important is breaking it down into smaller goals, right? So $208,000, that’s big. It’s scary. It’s overwhelming. We talk about the same thing when it comes to saving for retirement 20, 30, 40 years in the future. If you punch numbers in the calculator that show you’re going to have to save two, three, four, five million dollars, whoa, like what do I need to do? What does that actually mean today, right? 

So that $5,000 milestone, these goals that are along the way can really help with making it not only realistic but also providing some of the momentum along the way of, hey, we accomplish that. Let’s take a moment to pause, stop, celebrate. Maybe there’s even something that’s planned in there. Maybe there’s not. But just to realize that, yes, this is going to take some time. But we are making progress towards this journey. 

Paul, what about for you? Anything else here to add as it relates to the motivation and the momentum?

[00:14:51] PB: Yes. Everything that Jackie said was great. The small wins. I was not the one who was looking at the number quite a lot because she is the bill payer for us. So I would check in every once in a while and be like, “Where are we at,” and kind of provide emotional support throughout that part of the journey because I never wanted her to feel like – and, again, as the person who kind of inherited this debt with her, like, well, it’s not her fault or anything like that. That I want to feel like it was hers. It was ours together. Yes. But seeing those numbers kind of go down. 

It was nice throughout the whole process, at least for me, to realize, okay, we have a budget. It’s not a very serious budget. We’re not always letting that hang over our heads like, “Oh, we’re out somewhere doing this. Is this in the budget or not?” We never really had that pop up for us. So throughout this whole time, reaching many milestones, while also kind of living the life that we wanted to at that time, we never felt strapped or that we had to eat ramen for the next couple years to achieve this. That made things better, and that’s motivating in its own. Well, you could see, hey, we’re doing great. We could kind of keep this up as we’re going, right? 

[00:16:07] TU: Yes. I’m really glad you mention that, Paul, because I think that’s a good segue into everyone’s journey is different, right? So there’s a spectrum of how you can tackle these loans. You could be very aggressive. It could even be more aggressive, right? Someone could pay off $208,000 of debt in three, four, five years. Maybe in that case they say, “Hey, debt is the only thing I’m focused on. I’m not buying a home. I’m not investing. I’m not saving. I’m not doing other things.” We could debate like what are the pros, what are the cons of that approach. 

There’s the other end of the spectrum. You can take federal loans out 25 years, right? It could be a longer period of time. For some people, that is the pathway they choose, whether it’s a forgiveness pathway or not, so that their monthly payment is as low as possible, and they’re able to allocate dollars towards other parts of the financial plan. It sounds like for the two of you, it was somewhat in the middle, right? It was a fairly short timeline. That’s a large chunk of money in a 9, 10-year period. 

But, Paul, to your point, it sounds like, hey, there was also still the life that you were living, and there was some sacrifice, obviously. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have gotten to this point in time. But you were able to do some other things that you wanted to do, whether that be buy a home, whether that be investing, saving for the future, going on vacation, investing in experiences as a family. If I heard you right, Paul, it really felt like you were able to do both of those at once. Is that fair?

[00:17:30] PB: Yes, absolutely. I think it never reached the point at any moment for me like where we would have to make any kind of major lifestyle change or change up what we were doing throughout the whole process. 

[00:17:42] TU: Jackie, and this is one of the most common questions I get from new grads is should I pay off the debt or should I invest in the future. Then you add on top of that a home purchase is often a common thing, very challenging right now with what’s happening with home prices and interest rates. I think there’s this or mentality. Should I do this? Or should I do that? Or should I do this? Typically, as is the case in your journey, it’s more of an and often. So tell us about your feelings surrounding the aggressiveness or the length of time for the debt repayment. 

[00:18:15] JB: Yes. I think to your point, Tim, like the and and trying to make some financial compromises could help you set up your situation to be what you want it to be. So for example, like we got approved for a home loan of like $445,000 when we were looking at houses. Paul and I were like, “Wow, that’s a lot of money.” Then looking at homes at that time in 2014, the market was a bit different for houses. The houses that were at that value, we’re like, “We don’t need a home that’s $445,000. We can look for homes maybe around half that level and still get a really nice place to live and grow our family and everything.” 

So we ended up finding our house. Our purchase price was 225. So that alone was huge savings, compromising with we wanted discretionary funds to be able to go out and do things. Just we love like going out to eat, and hanging out with friends and family, and spending a little bit of money on things for vacation. That’s really important for us to have experiences with our family as well. So I think it’s talking with your partner. Or if you don’t have a partner, like thinking for yourself and your priorities in your life and where you want to allocate your finances. 

I think, for me, because I was so interested in like still getting this paid off quickly on a single income for most of the time, honestly, was to think of other outside-of-the-box ways to be able to make those extra payments happen. So picking up that side hustle of coaching, which, honestly, doesn’t feel like a job to me. It’s really fun. But all of the extra income we earn from that went towards typically our student loans. 

There are things we could have done differently with that as well with contract work and taxes and tax planning. There’s still so much that I have to learn that, thankfully, again, the YFP team is going to be helping us with. But thinking of how can you increase that income dollar for yourself and your family to work more aggressively if you want to or if you’re motivated by that as well. 

[00:20:32] TU: Yes I’m. glad you mentioned the extra income, right? We see that often where people are going through a debt repayment journey, and it will be a side hustle, extra shifts, extra income maybe for a long period of time, maybe for a short period of time. But that can really be a boost to, wow, we feel like we’re making some more progress, and maybe this is now a 9 or 8 or 7-year instead of a 10, 11, 12-year. Sometimes, the extra 100 or 200 bucks or 300 bucks, whatever the dollar amount is, may not seem significant. But we tend to forget the momentum that that can provide behaviorally, as well as a part of the plan. 

I just love what you guys shared about for you, for the two of you, for your family, you decided on that this was best, right? This approach of, hey, we’re going to pay off the debt. It’s pretty big payments. But we’re also going to find this balance of living our life. There’s no right or wrong answer here, and I think it’s so easy to fall into the trap of, hey, what’s the right way to do this. 

There’s a mathematical quote right answer, but we don’t live our lives according to just mathematically correct answers, right? So we’ve got to run the math, true. But we also have to think about what does it mean to live a rich life, and how do we find the balance between these two things? That’s true not only for debt repayment, but that’s true for all parts of the financial plan. 

[00:21:46] PB: If I could add to that, for me, kind of the extra money, the side hustle type of thing, we’ve always kind of thought of our income kind of separating those things. So before I left work, in my job, we had a bonus structure that we had a pretty hefty bonus that came at the end of the year. So what I found a lot of people running into trouble is that they relied on that bonus to pay for their regular everyday every year budget. For me, you take that mentality. Okay, here’s my salary. That’s my salary for the year. Let’s pretend that the bonus doesn’t exist, right?

The same thing with side hustle money, then when that becomes extra like, okay, that’s all of our goal money, right? It’s stuff to – like we paid for our wedding from my bonus. So any of those extra things that we know they’re going to cost a little bit extra more, that’s where kind of that side hustle, the extra income goes straight to that stuff. 

[00:22:41] JB: One other thing I wanted to mention here was that we refinanced our loan twice throughout the journey. So that savings on interest rate declined, which I know that interest rates are not great right now. But when we refinanced, well, I basically just kept checking every two years or so to see, okay, are there better interest rates available. Can we decrease that if possible? Because over time, that interest just adds up. Oh, there’s nothing that could make you more fired up than extra interest on your student loan. That was something that was also a great change to the process. 

[00:23:19] PB: Yes. Her last refinance. Sorry, Tim. Her last refinance was a big motivator, at least for me, because when she said, “Hey, look how much we knocked off,” and we looked at like the saving that we got through there, and I’m like, “Holy cow.” It was a significant amount. We’ve always kind of –

[00:23:35] JB: I think it was $33,000. 

[00:23:37] PB: Yes. It was crazy. So that was a big, big win, again, extra motivation to say, “Hey, we’re on the way. We’re going to do this.” Yes. Because I’m a big fan of paying off higher interest stuff first and kind of – she hates debt no matter what, so I always try to have that conversation like, “Well, if it’s a low, like we got 0.9 on our car right now. It’s like, hey, being ultra-aggressive may not be the best way, but we like to kick it out. But, yes, I mean, seeing lower interest rates is huge. 

[00:24:08] TU: Yes. Hopefully, we see those interest rates come back down. Right now, it’s – especially for those that only have federal loans, that’s probably the best place to be for most people, just because of some of the benefits that come with federal loans. But I’m guessing your first refinance was way before the pandemic. Is that correct?

[00:24:24] JB: Oh, yes. Yes.

[00:24:25] TU: Okay. So you already kind of had pulled yourself out of that where you weren’t negatively impacted in any significant way through the freeze because that decision was already made. Then at that point, it was really about, hey, how can we get the best interest rate that we can. It sounds like that led to some significant savings. 

At the time of this recording, we’re at the time period where student loan interest is turning back on. Payments are going to start back up after three and a half years, right? Dating back to March of 2020. I do really feel for the graduates [inaudible 00:24:59] classes that really haven’t yet had to make student loan payments, and this is going to be a somewhat of an abrupt transition. I’m hearing a lot of things like, “Tim, I’m overwhelmed. I’m confused. I’m frustrated. I’m anxious.” Not just about the student loans but also because of things we’ve already talked about. “I want to buy a home. I’ve got other goals I want to achieve. The six-figure income just isn’t really going to go as far as I thought it had.”

I’m just curious to hear from both of you. Jackie, let’s start with you. As you look back on your own journey and things that you’ve either said, “Hey, we did this really well, or maybe these are some things that we’ve done differently,” what advice would you have for these new graduates coming out?

[00:25:40] JB: Oh, so many things. I wish I would have done differently. Just get your budget in line first. I think knowing where you are spending and where you can cut back on expenses and even getting a wrap around that is really helpful and can maybe dismantle some of the doubts that you have about the fact that you can do this, I think. No, I didn’t get – I have no in incentive to say this. But like working with a financial planner like the team at YFP and like the resources that you all have, just even on your website, to check out. 

I remember looking at the student loan calculator and the change in interest rate and just playing around with the tools that are on there on your website. Just educate yourself. Find a mentor or a financial planner to work with. Get a budget in line. Those basic tools can be really helpful in giving you the motivation to realize that you can do this with a better understanding of your own personal situation and what’s possible. 

[00:26:43] TU: Paul, how about for you?

[00:26:45] PB: Yes. I would add, for anybody who graduated kind of during the pause, you haven’t had to experience like any of your payments kicking in yet. Having a – just budgeted in there, whether you’re paying it or not, right? Kind of figure out what method is best for you. Obviously, tons of research and I have an inside look at this stuff now as far as all the repayment plans. I mean, we’re kind of on fire with it right now. There are so many different ways. 

I love seeing how we can save people money because, again, we talk about our experience with, hey, we probably could have done student loan forgiveness. Find every option that’s available to you. Then don’t let it cripple you. Like I said, we lived a comfortable life on a single income; starting new family, buying a new house, getting married, getting married through residency. Just the busyness through that part of your life, there’s ways to do it. Yes. I just – stay motivated. Don’t be intimidated by that big number is kind of the best advice that I could give. 

[00:27:48] TU: Yes. I think it goes back to full circle. When you were talking earlier about the budget and breaking it down to smaller goals, making this number mean something today is such an important part and until you work the budget to know what capacity is or isn’t there and how this big rock is going to influence everything else you’re doing. We tend to live in that mental state of frustration. I’m confused. I’m overwhelmed. 

I often say, hey, when we put it all on paper, and, Paul, you’ve seen some of the behind the scenes of this, and you look at all the analyses, and we nerd out in the spreadsheet, we may not like the numbers. Nor will they change from this month to the next month. But the peace of mind that comes from knowing we’ve looked at these numbers, knowing what our options are, and knowing what the monthly payment will be. All right. Now, we can work on a plan, right? That is so important to understand. Otherwise, it’s a hope. It’s a wish. It’s a dream. It’s a guess, and that leads to frustration, right? We’re talking here about student loans, but that’s true with all parts of the financial plan. 

Let me ask you guys this. This is a huge milestone, a huge milestone. But it is one of many milestones that you’re going to accomplish on your financial journey. I think that for the pharmacists that are listening that are earlier in their career that are feeling some of the stress and the weight of their own student loans, they’re like, “Man, I just can’t wait until I get to that finish line, right?” That finish line where Jackie and Paul are. It’s a great accomplishment, but it’s not the finish line. You guys are just getting warmed up. 

So my question here is what’s next for you. Now that we’ve got the student loans behind us, when you fast forward and say, “Hey, five years from now, September 2028, like what does success look like for the Boyle family? Now that we’ve moved this big rock out of the way, we can start looking towards other parts of the plan.” Paul, let’s start with you. 

[00:29:34] PB: Yes. I’d say getting our retirement on track, that’s kind of top of mind. We still have our mortgage as far as debt, and we still have one car payment. But we’re going to knock out our car here pretty soon, and that’s going to be another win that gives us like, “Hey, we only have a mortgage.” That we don’t necessarily – you don’t need to pay that off as quick as you would think so. Just with that freedom, it’s like, “Holy cow, what are we going to do with this extra income?” I’m working again. That’s extra income. 

So, yes, I think saving for retirement, making sure that that is lined up and then maybe some home projects. I don’t know. Maybe I get something recreational or fun for me as a short-term goal if Jackie lets me. But we really don’t splurge on a lot of things and we haven’t for the past 10 years. So maybe it’s discussing do we have any kind of bigger fun things that we want to do within the next five years, and then look at the time beyond that, and make sure that us and our children kind of are set up for a comfortable life, our vision of what a comfortable life is. 

[00:30:42] JB: Oh, yes. I think to add, figuring out – I have so many questions about like investing in 529s or educational funds. We don’t really know what to do with that piece yet. We know we want to set up our kids for success for the future and whatever that looks like for them. I’ve always had dreams of like having a vacation home and somewhere we can go or rent out or like collaborate with friends or family on to have a place to make memories. 

Then I think the last piece is like giving back and determining where we can contribute to our community and just pay it forward in that direction as well. So, yes, we’re really excited. We just started working with the planning team at YFP. Yes. It’s been so enlightening so far. We’ve only had one meeting and I’ve just – I’m like in awe of how much we’ve learned in one short hour. So I’m sure it’s just the beginning of an awesome journey and lots of great things on the horizon. 

[00:31:41] TU: Well, this has been fantastic. Again, congratulations to the two of you. I am super excited to follow your journey and see where things are going. As I mentioned, I think you’re just getting warmed up. This is a huge, huge accomplishment, one that is certainly worth celebrating but lots of exciting times to come ahead. So, Jackie, Paul, thank you so much for taking time to join the podcast. I appreciate it. 

[00:32:01] JB: Thank you. 

[00:32:02] PB: Thank you so much, Tim. 

[END OF INTERVIEW]

[00:32:04] TU: As we conclude this week’s podcast, an important reminder that the content on this show is provided to you for informational purposes only and is not intended to provide and should not be relied on for investment or any other advice. Information in the podcast and corresponding materials should not be construed as a solicitation or offer to buy or sell any investment or related financial products. We urge listeners to consult with a financial advisor with respect to any investment. 

Furthermore, the information contained in our archived newsletters, blog posts, and podcasts is not updated and may not be accurate at the time you listen to it on the podcast. Opinions and analyses expressed herein are solely those of Your Financial Pharmacist, unless otherwise noted, and constitute judgments as of the dates published. Such information may contain forward-looking statements that are not intended to be guarantees of future events. Actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements. For more information, please visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/disclaimer. 

Thank you, again, for your support of the Your Financial Pharmacist Podcast. Have a great rest of your week. 

[END]

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YFP 330: How One Physician Had $550k+ of Loans Forgiven via PSLF


On this episode, sponsored by FirstHorizon, Brenna Roth, MD, MPH, shares her journey of having over $550k of student loans forgiven tax-free via Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF).

Episode Summary

Are student loan forgiveness programs a beacon of hope for graduates drowning in debt? Joining us this week is Brenna Roth, MD, MPH; a physician who achieved an incredible financial milestone – over $550,000 of student loans wiped clean through the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program. In our conversation, Brenna discusses her background in medicine, the accumulation of her student loan debt, her initial feelings about the debt, and her journey to tax-free forgiveness. She also shares advice for individuals facing high student loan debt and considering PSLF as an option. We also unpack the challenges of dealing with loan servicing companies, the impact of the COVID-19 payment freeze, and the benefits of lower monthly payments through income-driven repayment plans for those pursuing PSLF. If you’re curious about the PSLF program or facing significant student loan debt, Brenna’s inspiring story sheds light on the potential benefits of pursuing loan forgiveness and highlights the changing landscape of student loan repayment.

About Today’s Guest

Brenna Roth, MD, MPH is an infectious disease doctor and public health specialist who works in academic global health and research. She lived and worked in Tanzania for 3 years and has continued to work on international programs and research projects across sub-Saharan Africa since. She has successfully navigated the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program across multiple loan servicers, jobs, and continents.

Key Points From the Episode

  • Background about Brenna and her medical career journey.
  • Discover how Brenna accumulated a large amount of debt.
  • She shares her approach to tackling the student loan debt mountain.
  • Her hesitancy toward PSLF and what ultimately changed her mind.
  • Common pitfalls and mistakes people make regarding repayments.
  • Challenges with loan servicing companies and documentation.
  • Recent changes that have improved the PSLF program.
  • The pros and cons of the PSLF repayment plan.
  • Ways COVID-19 impacted student loan payments and the freeze on payments.
  • Brenna’s experience making minimal payments during her time abroad.
  • Benefits of lowering adjusted gross income through retirement contributions. 
  • How PSLF allowed Brenna to shift her focus towards long-term financial goals.
  • Advice for recent pharmacy and medical school graduates considering PSLF.

Episode Highlights

“Those high-interest rates building up over the years really impacted the amount [debt].” — Brenna Roth [0:04:53]

“My hesitancy was not knowing for sure, if after all of those years, [my debt] would actually be forgiven.” — Brenna Roth [0:10:51]

“It makes sense to, if you’re going to do PSLF, to pay during residency, fellowship, those kinds of years when you’re not making very much money.” — Brenna Roth [0:20:34]

“I think I would say, definitely give PSLF some serious consideration. I won’t say it’s the right thing for everybody. Obviously, it can depend on how much debt you have and what kind of job you are going into.” — Brenna Roth [0:25:04]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode

Episode Transcript

[INTRODUCTION]

[0:00:00] TU: Hey, everybody. Tim Ulbrich here, and thank you for listening to the YFP Podcast, for each week we strive to inspire and encourage you on your path towards achieving financial freedom. This week, I welcome Brenna Roth, a physician onto the show, to talk about her public service loan forgiveness (PSLF) journey, where she recently had more than $550,000 of loans forgiven, tax free.

Yes, you heard that right. More than $550,000 of student loans forgiven, tax-free. We talked about how she accumulated that large debt load, her feelings toward the debt, what went as planned, and didn’t go as planned along the way, and advice that she has for those that are facing high student loan debt.

Let’s hear from today’s sponsor, First Horizon, and then we’ll jump into my interview with Brenna Roth.

[SPONSOR MESSAGE]

[0:00:45] TU: Does saving 20% for a down payment on a home feels like an uphill battle? It’s no secret that pharmacists have a lot of competing financial priorities, including high student loan debt, meaning that saving 20% for a down payment on a home may take years. We’ve been on a hunt for a solution for pharmacists that are ready to purchase a home loan with a lower down payment and are happy to have found that option with First Horizon.

First Horizon offers a professional home loan option, aka doctor or pharmacist home loan that requires a 3% down payment for a single-family home or townhome, for first-time homebuyers, has no PMI and offers a 30-year fixed rate mortgage on home loans up to $726,200. The pharmacist home loan is available in all states except Alaska and Hawaii and can be used to purchase condos as well. However, rates may be higher and a condo review has to be completed.

To check out the requirements for First Horizon’s pharmacist home loan, and to start the pre-approval process, visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/home-loan. Again, that’s yourfinancialpharmacist.com/home-loan.

[INTERVIEW]

[0:01:58] TU: Brenna, welcome to the show.

[0:02:00] BR: Hi, thank you. 

[0:02:02] TU: Well, it’s been a while since we’ve shared some PSLF stories on the podcast. In fact, over a year and a half ago on episode 248, we featured three pharmacists that collectively had more than $700,000 in student loans forgiven. We’ll link to that episode in the show notes. But all that to say, it’s been a while, and I’m certainly excited for this conversation, which came to be after YFP Planning, Financial Planner, Kim Bolton, shared the good news with our team, about your MOHELA account officially showing a $0 balance with over $550,000 that was forgiven, tax-free. And as soon as I heard that, I thought, we have to share this story with our community.

Brenna, as I mentioned to you before we hit record, there still is a lot of skepticism, a lot of questions, a lot of unknowns, surrounding public service, loan forgiveness. I think the more stories that we can share, the more information that we can get out the better. So, before we dig into your specific journey, tell us a little bit about your background, including your journey into medicine, where you went to school, and the work that you’ve been doing since?

[0:03:07] BR: Yes. So, I’m a trained infectious disease doctor. I did my undergraduate work at Tulane University. I also got a Master’s of Public Health there. Then, I worked for a couple of years in public health work research, and then I went on to medical school at Ross University. I did my residency at York Hospital in Pennsylvania, and I did my infectious disease fellowship at the University of Maryland, and I’ve been working since then.

[0:03:40] TU: A lot of years of training. Certainly, our audience can appreciate that. You know, $550,000 of debt that’s forgiven, tax-free, that’s a big number, and I think even quite shocking to our community who’s used to high debt loads, but not that high, right? Maybe $150,000, $200,000 or $250,000. But over $550,000, again, that is a large amount. I assume, and one of my questions about your brand as we get started is how did that debt load come to be as big as it was? Is that a function of medical school, as well as the master’s degree? Tell us a little bit more about the accumulation phase of that amount of debt.

[0:04:19] BR: Yes. It’s from the loans that I took out for my Master’s of Public Health as well as medical school. I was paying off the Master’s of Public Health, initially, when I left school. But then when I started in medical school, that repayment was paused. But during that time, still, the loans were collecting interest. So, it was really that accumulation over all those years of the loans plus — and I’m sure people are familiar with, they have rather high-interest rates, and I was no exception. So yes, just those high-interest rates building up over the years really impacted the amount.

[0:04:58] TU: Yes. The accumulation of interest, on a couple $100,000 or more of debt adds up pretty quickly, especially over periods of time with training involved. I think that while most people know that, we have, somewhat Brenna forgotten that, just because of the last three years, we’ve been on this freeze. So, I think for those of us that graduated, many of my loans are at a fixed 6.8% interest on the federal side, and you quickly realize, like, whoa, and you’ve got a couple $100,000 of debt. If you’re not making payments that are covering that interest, that loan balance grows pretty quickly, and all of a sudden, 200 becomes 250, becomes 300. 

Now, if we’re pursuing public service loan forgiveness, and we get to the finish line of tax-free forgiveness, that’s not a bad thing. The goal is that we pay as minimum out of pocket as we can, to have as much as we possibly can, forgiven, and tax-free. But obviously, for those that go through the journey of paying those out of pocket, not through our forgiveness plan, certainly that can be a concern.

Brenna, I’m curious about your feelings surrounding the debt. No right or wrong answer. But I often talk with pharmacists. I joke it’s the student loan debt pain scale, 0 to 10. I talked with some pharmacists that may have a couple $100,000 of debt, and they describe it as a 10. The house is on fire, it’s causing anxiety, they’re frustrated, they’re worried. Even something like a PSLF strategy, they want these gone tomorrow. Even though the math shows it’s going to be favorable, it’s causing that much stress.

Other end of the spectrum, I’ll talk with pharmacists to say, I’m closer to a one or two or three. I recognize it’s a big deal, but they kind of are what they are. If it’s a longer payoff or forgiveness strategy, they may be more comfortable with that, to be able to maximize whatever they can dollars-wise. So, for you and your journey, what were your feelings surrounding the debt load, and did that change at all, as you were going through this PSLF journey?

[0:06:48] BR: It definitely changed over time. I mean, I would say it was at a tenant point. But honestly, I got to a point where, at one point, before I sorted into PSLF, I really just thought I will just have these debts forever, and it’s just going to be a part of my life and better to just accept it, and know that it’s just going to be there. So, I would say it went from a 10 to maybe more like 5 or 6, because I won’t say that I wasn’t at all concerned. But it kind of diminished. But with PSLF, I think it – well, initially, I won’t say it decreased, because I was a little skeptical about whether it was the best choice and I also, over time, I switched the companies that were handling my loans. That never proved to be a really great transition.

So, that was always stressful, because I was always worried that documentation or information would be lost, and the efforts I’d been putting in would not show up at the end, like something would go wrong. So, there were moments where stress kind of went up about all of it. But I would say overall, maybe it was only the last probably few years that I kind of – it dropped below a five for me when I started to have more confidence that things were really moving and things were really going to actually be forgiven.

[0:08:29] TU: Yes. I’m glad you brought that up with the loan servicing companies, right? That’s something we hear often, which is, those can be headaches to navigate. I mean, even right now with the new safe plan that’s coming out, people’s payments are being calculated incorrectly. For good reasons, people are freaking out, wanting to get the right information. Might have to recertify income. Should I recertify an income right now? I mean, there’s just so many nuances and wrinkles. I think as you go through some of the pain of those, and you get over those speed bumps, you tend to get a little bit more comfortable knowing how to navigate it.

But unfortunately, the difficulties with the loan servicing companies, that hasn’t gotten a whole lot better. I think people have gotten more comfortable with PSLF, because of hearing stories like yours, or we’re getting more education and information to make sure that they’re crossing the T’s and dotting the I’s correctly. But we would be lying if we said it’s going to be a clean journey for everyone, right? Just 10 years, 120 payments, you wake up, it’s tax-free. That’s the goal. But it doesn’t mean there’s not going to be some bumps along the way as well.

[0:09:34] BR: Definitely.

[0:09:35] TU: You mentioned reluctancy. I want to talk more about that. Is that something we hear a lot? I often will present on student loans, and when I show the calculations, I think, people nerd out and they get really excited about, “Oh, I can optimize this, and maybe it allows me to achieve other financial goals because I’m not having to put as much towards my student loans.” But there still is very much a sense and feeling of, what if? What if the rules change? What if this isn’t everything that I think it’s going to be? So, I want you to talk a little bit more about your reluctance, what were some of those questions, and then what ultimately changed, that allowed you to say, “Okay, yes, this is the path that I’m going to pursue.”

[0:10:17] BR: So, it should be noted that I was first presented really seriously, shortly after signing up with them with Tim, with YFP. Because this was, my loans were probably my major financial concern at the time. This was 2016, 2017, and I’d heard about the program. But I hadn’t really heard of anybody successfully navigating it, for sure. So, I think it was just not really knowing – my hesitancy was not knowing for sure, if after all of those years, things would actually be forgiven. Of course, as you mentioned, the strategy really is to lower your payments as much as possible and to get through those 10 years, meeting the requirements. But taking as little financial hit as possible.

Which the alternative to that would be, okay, let’s focus on making paying off as much as we can each month, and getting this paid down as quickly as possible. So, you’re accumulating as little interest. Those are like the two options that were presented to me. While it was clear that PSLF made the most sense, on paper, my reluctance came from not being totally sure that at the end of that 10 years, and that would be 10 years wasted in accumulating interest. All of these things, and that was really where my hesitancy came from. Again, this was a number of years ago, when there wasn’t as much evidence that the program was really going to definitively work. I even – I didn’t know if – I even had the concern of what if they just up and decide to cancel it for some reason?

So, it was really that. And you did hear horror stories of people thinking that they were doing everything right for years, and then getting nine years in, and being told, “Oh, no, you were in the wrong repayment plan”, or whatever it may be. During one of my switches from – actually, no. I was checking in with my loan servicer, and just to see is everything on track, is everything look okay. I felt pretty comfortable because you guys were helping me. So, I felt like I’s were dotted, T’s were crossed, but I was still checking in, and they actually told me, “Oh, we don’t go back and check that stuff until it’s like the last year of repayment.” And suddenly, I realized, “Oh, that’s why people get to the end, and they don’t know, because nobody’s really reaching out and communicating with them that this isn’t correct, or this should be.” So, people were getting really far along before getting any feedback that anything was not correct.

[0:13:12] TU: Yes. And when you mentioned the skepticism for good reason, that was around 2017. Is that correct?

[0:13:17] BR: Yes, 2016 or ’17, somewhat in there.

[0:13:21] TU: Yes. Which totally makes sense, right? This program was legislatively enacted in 2007,10-year timeline to forgiveness. That first group to be forgiven would have been in 2017, 2018. This is where a lot of the initial negative press came out. To be fair, the Department of Ed could have done a lot better job in terms of, communicating this and preventing some of these problems that people were identifying it to your point, at the end, when they’re getting near the finish line. Even in the six, or seven years since then, the information has gotten a lot better, the education has gotten a lot better. I think the loan servicers are more comfortable. Still not necessarily easy to always work with, more comfortable. The path, even with employers, now there’s a, through the studentaid.gov profile, you can punch in the EIN of your employer and see if there are qualifying employers. Even those questions in the past were like, “Am I 100% sure that I’m working for a qualified employer?”

For a good reason, you had skepticism, and when you’re talking about the horror stories, I’ve mentioned to you before we hit record that there was an article published by NPR. I think it was 2018, 2019 that the headline was “99% of PSLF applicants are denied.” Somewhat of a misleading story. We haven’t actually looked into the details in terms of the number of people who didn’t fully complete their application and the paperwork. But there were fair issues, and those issues being, “Oh, I didn’t realize that I had to maybe first consolidate my loan into a direct loan, to be able to then unlock a qualifying repayment plan so that then it counted as a qualifying payment.” It’s even crazy when I present on this topic, Brenna, like, I even catch myself like, well, if you do this, and then you do this, and then you do this, then it counts as a green checkmark, right? Then we’re good.

It’s kind of crazy that we have to jump through all these hoops. But that’s just the system that we’re in and the cards that we’ve been dealt. Now, thankfully, you were positively impacted by some of the changes that the Biden administration implemented where for individuals that maybe didn’t have all those T’s or I’s crossed because they didn’t necessarily know from Jump Street that they were going on a PSLF pathway, that there was a reconciliation process for those payments to count as qualifying payments, which you benefited from, is that correct? 

[0:15:33] BR: Yes, because when I consolidated and got everything in order, and that was actually another thing. I didn’t realize, because you mentioned employment and the employer’s account. I really did not think that my residency training would count, and it was actually, again, Tim, who pointed out that he really thought it would. So, that was another thing that pushed me once I realized that that period of time also counted, that that shifted, I think, my willingness to go into PSLF.

But yes, I did benefit because I did have a – some of my loans were in the correct repayment plan, but I had some that were not. So, there was a gap of, I don’t know, maybe four or five years between some of the loans just because once I got those into the correct repayment plan, you know, it started from zero. So, it didn’t matter that I’ve been paying those loans for years, none of those previous payments had counted, because they weren’t in the correct repayment plan.

But luckily, with that Biden, that like one year, going back and counting, a lot of those payments that hadn’t previously counted towards the forgiveness were counted, which was great.

[0:16:48] TU: Yes. I think it was really helpful, especially for people Brenna, like you, that maybe necessarily didn’t start with a PSLF journey in mind. We are seeing more people now that they come out, they go into residency, they know, “Okay, I’m not going to defer, so I can count those as qualifying payments” and they’re thinking about PSLF as a strategy right away. But that hasn’t always been the case. Again, just based on the age of the program and the information that we have available.

One of the things that is beneficial about the strategy, as you’ve mentioned, as I’ve mentioned, is to try to pay as little out of pocket so that we can have as much forgiven tax-free. You mentioned before we hit record that you were able to have about five years, about half of the 10-year timeline of payments, actually, where you weren’t having to make payments at all. Tell us more about what was happening, where you were able to have such a large chunk of time where you didn’t have to make those payments.

[0:17:40] BR: Yes. So, everybody has been affected by the pause in payments with COVID. So, I was also affected by that. But I moved to Tanzania, actually in 2017. I was living there, full time. Because of that, it affected my taxes, and basically what it looked like, what my income looked like, and thus my repayment. So, if I remember correctly, there were a couple of years there where technically I could have been paying zero. I was still paying a small amount on my loans. But yes, I had a couple of years there, where just because of living internationally and working internationally. My income appeared low enough that – because it’s income-based, and so basically, my payment was functionally zero.

[0:18:33] TU: Yes. You had a few years of the pandemic freeze, as did other borrowers, were those counted as qualifying payments. That was one of the big questions when that freeze started, and that was good news that people that were pursuing PSLF, those counted as qualifying payments to the freeze that just ended here in September of 2023. Then, you have a couple years in Tanzania, you mentioned, perhaps this could have been zeroed out payments. You’re making small payments.

I’m glad you mentioned that because one of the most common questions that I get is should I defer my loans during residency, or in your case, residency and fellowship. While not blanket advice, generally, my answer is you don’t want to defer, and the reason you don’t want to defer is that typically because you’re earning such a low income while you’re in residency or fellowship relative to what you will earn, and how they do the calculations on these, often these will be very low, and sometimes $0 monthly payments. But as long as you’re inactive repayment, those count towards qualifying payments of the 120.

So, I still think there’s a lot of advice out there from maybe my generation of pharmacists or those even older. I graduated in 2008, where it was kind of blanket advice. Like differing residency, differing residency, and often the case may be actually not to defer, so you can get those accounts as qualifying payments. 

[0:19:54] BR: Yes. It’s funny that you mentioned that, because you just triggered – that was – I think that’s actually, because I still had that had a feeling of what if something goes wrong with a PSLF. So even though I was being told those couple of years, “You don’t have to make a payment, it’s zero, it will still count.” I made the decision to make a small payment because I didn’t want anybody to be able to come back later and say, “Oh, you weren’t paying during these times.” So, I still had my own little, is this really going to work the way it’s supposed to work even at that point? But definitely, it makes sense to, if you’re going to do PSLF, to pay during residency, fellowship, those kinds of years when you’re not making very much money. 

[0:20:44] TU: Yes, and one of the other, we won’t spend much time on this now. We’ll talk about it in another episode. But one of the advantages of the new save plan that was announced by the Biden administration here in the last couple of months, and certainly, it’s not the right fit for everyone. But especially those that are new graduates, new trainees in residency, there’s a provision as a part of that safe plan where as long as you’re making the minimum payment, whatever that is, based on your income, that your loan balance can’t grow, which is really nice. Because if you’re in deferment, like interest can still accumulate, you’re not making any payment technically. So, especially for those that are in one or two or more years of residency that can be, that can be really valuable.

Brenna, what did PSLF allow you to do in terms of other goals. Typically, if we’re optimizing the strategy, we’re hopefully paying less out of pocket than we normally would have with other strategies. And therefore, that gives us options to invest and save, or pursue other financial goals, where we don’t have to just solely focus on our student loans. So, for your situation, for your financial plan, what did PSLF allow you to do in terms of other goals?

[0:21:51] BR: I really, for the most part, focus a little bit more on investment retirement, and because really, I hadn’t been too focused on that until I was finishing a fellowship, going into an actual job, and I’m feeling like I had that money. So, I think that allowed me to focus a little bit. Because as I said, I sort of always thought that these loans would just be part of my life. So, it shifted my long-term thinking, and as we discussed before, having the loans forgiven didn’t really change my day to day. But even during that process, I think, instead of being so focused on I’m going to have to repay this at some point, I could really focus on that longer term, where do I want to invest my money.

I mean, yes, it did allow, because I think I would have been far more reluctant to maybe take this trip or that trip, for fear of what that meant longer term. So, it probably did allow me to feel a little more free to do those kinds of things. But for me, it was really more about the longer-term goals and being able to focus more on investments and retirement plans and those kinds of things.

[0:23:16] TU: That’s one of the things I love about this strategy is when we’re optimizing this, one of the goals we’re trying to achieve is to lower our adjusted gross income, the best that we can, which is the factor they’re using in the payment calculation to determine what your monthly payment is. One of the ways we can do that, kind of the low-hanging fruit, is making sure we’re maxing out traditional retirement accounts like a 401(k), a 403(b), and maxing out HSAs. So, there’s this beautiful double effect of not only are we then saving more through those vehicles, which are going to be able to grow and compound and time value of money, make sure we start that as early as we possibly can. But it’s also at the same time, lowering our monthly student loan payment, and that’s really cool. When we can see that working, and we all know our listeners know well, that when you’re saving even just a little bit more early in your career, and that money has a long time period to grow, that’s going to have a significant impact and effect. 

Brenna, I’m curious, we have a group of graduates coming out right now that many may be listening to the show. We have three graduating classes now that haven’t had to make any payments on student loans, because of the freeze. Interest just started back up in September. Payments are resuming here next month in October. I think it’s fair to say, there’s a decent amount of anxiety. Maybe people that were making payments that didn’t have to, and now they’re having to make payments again. Or for new graduates, or just on the front end of this journey, and not really sure what is ahead, but certainly there’s some anxiety surrounding that. As you look backwards now, finish line has been crossed. You’ve had a large amount of debt forgiven, tax-free. What advice would you have, whether it’s pharmacy graduates, or medical school graduates, that are just getting started and they’re looking ahead and saying, “This feels big. This feels scary.”

[0:25:03] BR: I think I would say, definitely give PSLF some serious consideration. I won’t say it’s the right thing for everybody. Obviously, it can depend on how much debt you have, and what kind of job are you going into. How much are you going to be making? I’m in infectious diseases in medicine. That’s not a subspecialty that is known to make a lot of money compared to some others. So, for others – and I don’t know as much about pharmacists, and their training, and different specialties within that. But I would assume there’s some variation as well.

So, I think it is a very individual decision. And for me, though, as I said, having a financial planner, being able to discuss it, really just my income to debt ratio, PSLF was just very clearly the best option for me. So, I think, just really give it some serious consideration, and don’t talk yourself out of it immediately. It is working. Just my experience over many years, and with many different – having my loans switched from different companies, I can tell you, it’s been so much easier recently to be able to track things, to get information about things. It’s gotten so much easier over the years. I mean, it does work. There are more and more people with loans being forgiven. So, I hope that the concern and the fears are diminishing over time. I won’t say everybody needs to go out and do it. But I think it should be definitely a serious consideration as an option.

[0:26:52] TU: Yes. I’m glad you said that. We estimate in pharmacy, and I know it’s higher in medicine, just based on the distribution of practice, and where people are at nonprofit to for profit. But we estimate that about 25% to 30% of all pharmacy graduates are eligible or qualify for PSLF.

Now, they may not have the right debt-to-income ratio. It may not make sense. They may be unsure about how long they’re going to be in the nonprofit space, and there’s other questions. But to your point, Brenna, I think the take-home point I hear there is making sure that you’re considering it among all of the options, and running the numbers, how do we feel about it? What does this mean for other parts of the financial plan? And making sure that we feel that we’re making an informed decision, looking at all the different options that we have on the table. For some, that’s PSLF. For some, that could be a non-PSLF strategy over a long period of time, if they’re working for a for-profit. Or we have some individuals that say, “Hey, I really want to aggressively pay these off.” And they have reasons and a rationale that may make sense for them.

So, this is certainly an area where, whether we like it or not, student loan repayment is a somewhat complicated topic, and it’s something that we’ve really got to dig into and make sure that we’ve got good information as we look at and evaluate all the options that are available.

Well, Brenna, this has been awesome. I really appreciate you taking the time coming on the show to share your journey of having over $550,000 of debt that was forgiven, tax-free. As I mentioned at the beginning, we’re going to share some other resources in the show notes of where we’ve talked about public service, loan forgiveness, as well. And to the Department of Ed’s credit, as you gave them credit here, I think recently, of information getting better in the loan servicing companies. They have updated a lot of information and resources, and especially with so much changing right now, make sure to check that out at studentaid.gov.

Again, Brenna, thank you so much for taking time to come on the show.

[0:28:38] BR: Thank you.

[0:28:40] TU: Before we wrap up today’s show, I want to again, thank this week’s sponsor of Your Financial Pharmacist podcast, First Horizon. We’re glad to have found a solution for pharmacists that are unable to save 20% for a down payment on a home. A lot of pharmacists in the YFP community have taken advantage of First Horizon’s pharmacist home loan, which requires a 3% down payment for a single-family home or townhome for first-time homebuyers, and has no PMI on a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage.

To learn more about the requirements for First Horizon’s pharmacist home loan, and to get started with the pre-approval process, you can visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/home-loan. Again, that’s yourfinancialpharmacist.com/home-loan.

[OUTRO]

[0:29:24] TU: As we conclude this week’s podcast, an important reminder that the content on this show is provided to you for informational purposes only and it is not intended to provide and should not be relied on for investment or any other advice. Information in the podcast and corresponding materials should not be construed as a solicitation or offer to buy or sell any investment or related financial products. We urge listeners to consult with a financial advisor with respect to any investment. 

Furthermore, the information contained in our archived newsletters, blog post, and podcast is not updated and may not be accurate at the time you listen to it on the podcast. Opinions and analysis expressed herein are solely those of Your Financial Pharmacist unless otherwise noted and constitute judgments as of the dates published. Such information may contain forward-looking statements, which are not intended to be guarantees of future events. Actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements. For more information, please visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/disclaimer. 

Thank you again for your support of the Your Financial Pharmacist Podcast. Have a great rest of your week.

[END]

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YFP 329: Medicare Selection & Optimization: Common Mistakes, Tips & Tricks


On this week’s podcast, sponsored by APhA, Certified Insurance Counselor, Insurance Agent, and Medicare Specialist, Josh Workman, joins the show to cover Medicare 101 and considerations for selecting your Medicare coverage plan.

Episode Summary

Many people (including pharmacists!) aren’t fully informed about Medicare, the options they need to consider, and the pros and cons of each option. That’s why, in this week’s episode of the podcast, we brought on Certified Insurance Counselor, Insurance Agent, and Medicare Specialist, Josh Workman to give us a Medicare 101! Tuning in, you’ll hear about Josh’s role in the world of helping seniors navigate Medicare benefits, options for coverage, and the five main differences between Medicare Advantage and Supplement plans. Finally, he shares some words of wisdom for pharmacists struggling to answer Medicare questions for themselves, family members, and even clients.

About Today’s Guest

Located in the Akron Ohio area Josh Workman has been an insurance agent since 2010 with Medicare planning being his main area of focus. He started his career with Nationwide, but then moved to an Independent agency in 2014. Aside from helping individuals who are new to Medicare, he also works with professionals such as care facility coordinators, doctors and pharmacists as they assist their patients with Medicare plan decisions. Medicare can be extremely confusing so instead of the salesman angle, Josh takes an educational approach when helping his clients with Medicare Supplements, Part D Plans and Medicare Advantage Plans. One of his favorite parts of the job is teaching Medicare 101 classes to people who are new to Medicare.

Key Points From the Episode

  • What Josh does in the Medicare world. 
  • The basics of Medicare and the timelines for selecting coverage. 
  • Two main options for coverage when going onto Medicare. 
  • Five differences between Advantage Coverage and Supplement Coverage. 
  • A quick summary of the two plans and the pros and cons of each. 
  • The kinds of plans Josh sees people choosing and why. 
  • Some of the dangers of being influenced by marketing when choosing a Medicare plan. 
  • Mistakes that Josh sees people making when buying a plan. 
  • Advice for leveraging the help of a Medicare agent for pharmacists.

Episode Highlights

A lot of people make an assumption that original Medicare – Part A and Part B, includes prescription drug coverage. It actually does not. The only way you can get Part D is through an insurance company.” — Josh Workman [0:10:46]

If you have to pay medical bills, if you have a network, you’re probably going to be paying less for your insurance because you’re subjecting yourselves to these medical bills and to this network.” — Josh Workman [0:15:21]

“Medicare Advantage is less expensive. There’s a network and there’s medical bills. Supplement is more expensive, but it doesn’t have a network and it doesn’t have medical bills.” — Josh Workman [0:20:20]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode

Episode Transcript

[INTRODUCTION]

[0:00:00] TU: Hey, everybody. Tim Ulbrich here, and thank you for listening to the YFP Podcast, for each week we strive to inspire and encourage you on your path towards achieving financial freedom. This week, I welcome to the show Josh Workman, a Certified Insurance Counselor, Insurance Agent, and Medicare Specialist. 

Aside from helping individuals who are new to Medicare, he also works with professionals such as care facility coordinators, doctors, and pharmacists as they assist their patients with Medicare plan decisions. We tap into his Medicare experience to discuss five key considerations for evaluating Medicare benefit options. You’ll find this episode insightful and helpful, whether you are evaluating benefits for yourself or helping patients or other family members navigate this process. 

All right, let’s hear from today’s sponsor of the American Pharmacists Association and then we’ll jump in my interview with Josh Workman. 

[SPONSOR MESSAGE]

[0:00:50] TU: Today’s episode of the Your Financial Pharmacists Podcast is brought to you by the American Pharmacists Association. APHA has partnered with Your Financial Pharmacists to deliver personalized financial education benefits for APHA members. Throughout the year APHA will be hosting a number of exclusive webinars covering topics like student loan, debt payoff strategies, home buying, investing, insurance needs, and much more. Join APHA now to gain premier access to these educational resources and to receive discounts on YFP products and services. You can join APHA at a 25% discount by visiting pharmacists.com/join and using the coupon code YFP. Again, that’s pharmacists.com/join and using the coupon code YFP. 

[INTERVIEW]

[0:01:37] TU: Josh, welcome to the show. 

[0:01:38] JW: Thanks for having me, Tim. 

[0:01:40] TU: Well, this is a treat. You and I have known each other for a long time when Jess and I lived up in Northeast Ohio. Our families got to know each other well. I’ve always appreciated the work that you’ve done on the Medicare side. It’s taken us over 300 episodes, but I’m excited to finally bring this together to be able to tap into your Medicare experiences and knowledge. Thank you so much for coming on. 

[0:02:03] JW: Yeah. Thanks again for having me, Tim. 

[0:02:05] TU: Josh, as we were planning for this episode, and here we are in the month of October, we’re talking about all different aspects related to the health insurance part of the financial plan and we realize that Medicare really isn’t a topic that we’ve talked really much about, maybe not even at all, but it’s such an important part of the financial plan for those that are making that transition into retirement. 

As we were planning for this episode, we were thinking about a few different groups that may find value in this, right? Of course, there’s individuals listening that are getting ready to make that Medicare decision for themselves and making sure that they’re optimizing that benefit selection. But perhaps, even a bigger group would be, “Hey, I’ve got aging parents that are going through this phase.” Or, “I work at a pharmacy and often I have patients that come looking for help in terms of Medicare selection and what are some of the things that I should be thinking about.” I know, Josh, in your work as well, you consult with individuals that are going through selection, but also work with other providers and facilities as well. Is that correct? 

[0:03:05] JW: Yeah. Yeah, that’s correct. I’m working with individuals or maybe in a group setting, like a seminar setting is a lot of what I do. But then, yeah, working with pharmacists, working with doctors, working with assisted living facilities, all those types of professionals have questions and I’m able to help their patients as well. 

[0:03:25] TU: Let’s start with some of the basics of Medicare, Josh. Pharmacists get really a slim amount of this in pharmacy’s glamour. We talked about health insurance at large. We talked about the different parts of Medicare. It’s been 15 years for me, perhaps more for others that are listening as well. Let’s start with some of the basics, Medicare 101, Parts A through D. Just break down for us what those different parts cover. 

[0:03:49] JW: Yeah, sure. There’s two parts to what’s referred to as original Medicare. That’s Part A, like Adam. Part B, like boy. A would be hospital benefits. You’d use your Part A coverage, for example, if you were in the hospital staying overnight for a surgery. Let’s say, Part B, like boy, that’s going to be medical benefits. Think of that as more outpatient-related things, specifically, like just going to the doctor, seeing a specialist, an outpatient surgery, those kinds of things. But then there’s a couple other parts as well, Medicare Part D, like David, or I like to think of it as D for drugs. That’s the easy way to remember that one. That’s going to be the prescription drug coverage. Part C is another way of saying Medicare Advantage. We’ll get into this, I believe in a little bit, but that would be Part C, which combines A, B, and D benefits into one plan. 

[0:04:47] TU: Awesome. Timeline for coverage. This is something that I remember learning about this and just having the takeaway of like, this is important. You don’t want to mess up in terms of when you’re selecting coverage, making sure you’re not missing a deadline. What is the timeline for selecting coverage? 

[0:05:03] JW: Yup. There’s going to be three main election periods if you want to think of them that way. Three times when you will be signing up for your plan, making decisions on your plan. I will say, there’s a lot of narrative out there that makes this a little scarier than it needs to be. It’s not that intimidating, but the first one is what’s called your initial election period. This is when folks are turning 65, they’re new to Medicare. 

Another thing when someone could be using their initial election period is if they’re been on social security disability for 24 months, or if they develop end-stage renal disease or ALS, that’s another time prior to age 65, they can go on Medicare. Let’s use the turning 65, example because that’s the most common. It’s a seven-month window. It starts three months prior to your birth month, runs the month of your birth, and then three months after. A seven-month window when you can sign up. Most folks will use the three months prior and then start their benefits, the month of their birth. That’s the most common. 

[0:06:12] TU: That is a pretty – I didn’t actually realize it was that long in terms of the seven months or the three months prior, the month of your birth date, and then the three months after. Then the other piece I’m thinking about here would be the transition or change, right? I had initial coverage I selected here. We’re using the example of 65, but I’m looking at other options in the future in terms of renewals. How does that work timeline-wise? 

[0:06:33] JW: Yeah. Great question. That would be what’s referred to as the annual election period or annual enrollment. 

[0:06:39] TU: Okay. 

[0:06:40] JW: That is a window of opportunity towards the end of the year, getting into it now. October 15th through December 7th of the specific dates. That’s for folks who, yeah, let’s say, for example, they’re 67, they’ve been on Medicare for a couple of years now, but they want to reevaluate and see if the plan that they’re on now is going to be the best one for the coming year. They can evaluate that during the weeks, again, of October 15th through December 7th. Then their change, if they do make a plan change, it would start taking effect on January 1st of the following year. 

[0:07:17] TU: Okay. Those are the two main ones I’ve heard you mention so far. So, that initial election and then the annual enrollment process. Anything else important to remember around the timeline for selecting coverage? 

[0:07:30] JW: Yeah. There could be a third election period. Just think of them as special election periods. We do run into these. I do run into them every now and then, but if someone moves, for example. Moves out of state maybe or it could even be a move to a different county within the same state, they would qualify for a special election period to make a change. If someone gains or loses Medicaid eligibility, we recently saw a lot of that with the COVID benefits that were extended for folks on Medicaid. 

They basically, couldn’t lose their Medicaid eligibility, but that stopped. I believe it was in April of this year. That qualifies for a special election period to make a change or if there’s other things too, like you have a parent who moves into an institution for lack of a better word, where they’re moving into a long-term care facility or a nursing home. That would also qualify as a special election period to make a change outside of annual enrollment. October 15th through December 7th. 

[0:08:31] TU: Awesome. With that background information, let’s spend most of our time here talking about evaluating benefit options, what to look for, what to consider. Before we get into five main areas that you’ve seen, five big differences based on your experiences. I think it’s important that we differentiate at least at a high-level Medicare advantage and Medicare supplement plans because when we talk about some of these areas here in just a moment, we’re going to be referring to both of those and the different sides to consider between them. Define those further, for us. 

[0:09:00] JW: Yeah. So generally speaking, you have two main options for coverage when you go on to Medicare. I should say this is what most folks do. Most folks will either go with a Medicare Advantage plan or a Medicare supplement. Medicare advantages is much more heavily advertised. Sometimes folks think that’s the only option they have, but they technically don’t. Supplements are an option as well, but there’s going to be five major differences between those two plans that can really impact how you receive your care, what you’re going to pay out of pocket when you use your insurance, how you get your drug coverage, if it includes perks like dental, vision, hearing, all those kinds of things. 

Yeah. There are some pretty major differences between those. That’s what I spend most of my time with my clients who are new to Medicare, so they can make an informed decision on what’s best for them. 

[0:09:53] TU: Yeah. I remember Josh, you shared with me as we were preparing for this episode. The worksheet that you have of the two sides of the street, right? Choosing a plan. Advantage versus supplement and going through these, which I really like, because I think this can become very overwhelming, either as an individual choosing coverage, helping a family member, helping a patient, especially when so often, as you mentioned, especially on the advantage plan side, there’s just a lot of advertising, right? That’s behind this. 

The mailings, the commercials, etc. so really being able to take a step back and say, “What are the options and how can we objectively compare these. What do we need? What do we not need to make an informed decision?” I think is so important, not only financially, but also just have the peace of mind and being able to navigate some of the nuances involved here. Let’s start with those five big differences. Number one, Josh, is Part D in terms of how one receives Part D insurance coverage. Tell us more there. 

[0:10:44] JW: Yeah. It’s important to know a lot of people sometimes make an assumption that original Medicare, what we talked about before, Part A and Part B, that includes prescription drug coverage. It actually does not. The only way you can get Part D is through an insurance company. Now, how it would work on either side of the street. Yes, the way I like to describe it. If you go with a Medicare Advantage plan, most of the time, those are going to include prescription drug coverage at no additional cost. If you go with the Medicare Supplement plan, however, it does not include prescription drug coverage or Part D, you have to buy that separately. Advantage is included. Supplement, it’s not included. You have to pick it up separately. 

[0:11:27] TU: Number two, it relates to the network here. We’re thinking of options for providers, access to hospitals, something that folks are familiar with from other experiences with health insurance, but what are some of the factors to consider here as relates to network coverage and the two sides of the street? 

[0:11:43] JW: Medicare Advantage plans are going to have a network. Meaning there’s a list of specific doctors, hospital systems, specialists that you need to stay within in order to have coverage or to pay the least amount possible. Medicare supplements, one of the big benefits of them is they do not have a network of any kind. You can literally go to any provider in the country, in the whole United States, that takes original Medicare and they have to accept your supplement. It doesn’t matter what insurance company you have. You could be in the Northeast Ohio area like we are and have an insurance company that’s local here and receive care in California and they’ve never heard of your local company, but they have to take it, because it’s a Medicare supplement. 

[0:12:32] TU: That network piece, obviously, very important to folks. The third area, which I’m sure is the one we’re often focused on is the cost side of it, the medical bills or the cost-sharing, ultimately what we have to pay out of pocket when using insurance. What are some of the key differences here between the advantage and the supplement? 

[0:12:50] JW: With a Medicare Advantage Plan, you will have medical bills along the way as you use your insurance, or just you could say if you use your insurance. By medical bills, I’m referring to deductibles, co-pays, and co-insurance. You may have a deductible. Honestly, most plans I offer, Tim, don’t have a deductible, folks have to reach, but they could. 

A co-pay, you know how that works, most likely you pay $25 to your primary care, 40 to a specialist, those kinds of things. Then co-insurance is a percentage, right? You may have to pay 20% for durable medical equipment or 20% for chemo and radiation. The nice thing about Advantage Plans is that they do put a limit on what your medical bills can be. Most folks have this with your current insurance, even if you’re not on Medicare, called an annual maximum out-of-pocket expense. 

All of your medical bills for the year can’t exceed your plan’s annual maximum. But know that, again, you will have them along the way, medical bills, that is. Whereas Medicare supplements, they don’t really have any medical bills that you’re going to have to worry about. Okay. Really, the biggest medical bill for the most popular supplement that I write out of my office is the Part B, like boy, deductible. Currently here for 2023. It’s $226, so you pay that for any Part B service. Once that’s paid though, Tim, the medical bills are done for the rest of the year. 

[0:14:26] TU: Wow. 

[0:14:26] JW: So that $226 deductible is your medical bill and it’s also your annual maximum. If you want to think about it that way. 

[0:14:34] TU: Okay. So, very naive on this topic, Josh, but you’re just describing the differences and obviously when you talk about the Supplement plan and the lower amount, what I seem to hear is not insignificant, but a much lower amount on the deductible, less potential out of pocket versus when you reference the Advantage plans more out of pocket. What we tend to think of from our experiences right now for many of us with the insurance. So, is it fair to say that cost-wise monthly premiums, you typically see a vast difference between these two, because of that or is that – it depends? 

[0:15:11] JW: No, you’re right. There’s a difference in cost. So, that would be the fourth big difference here between these two. As I’m sure listeners are putting together, if you have to pay medical bills, if you have a network. Well, you’re probably going to be paying less then for your insurance, because you’re subjecting yourselves to these medical bills into this network. 

Medicare Advantage is going to be your less expensive route to take. It could even be, and folks may have seen this advertised. You could even see that these Medicare Advantage plans are zero dollars per month. Okay. Those are actually some of the most popular advantage plans. 

[0:15:46] TU: Interesting. 

[0:15:48] JW: Some of my clients will choose is the zero-dollar premium plan. Okay. Now with supplements, though, these are going to have a monthly cost. There aren’t any zero-dollar Medicare supplements. This currently, I mean, it all really depends on the area that you live in. I just work here in the state of Ohio, but here in Ohio, a good rule of thumb for a turning 65 mail for a Medicare supplement, depending on the plan letter that’s chosen is probably going to be somewhere between $130 to $150 a month for a Medicare supplement. Female would be a little bit lower. Again, that’s a pretty rough estimate, Tim, just depending on the service area that you’re in. 

[0:16:37] TU: Yeah. It’s really helpful, though, Josh. I’m thinking about how this integrates back with the financial plan. It’s taking me back to episode 275. Tim and I talked about how to build a retirement paycheck, right? We’ve been accumulating funds. Hopefully, for the majority of our careers. Now we have to be able to replace what was coming from our income through the different retirement vehicles that we’ve built, right? 401Ks, IRAs, maybe we have some HSA funds that can come into play here, as well. 

This is important, right? Because if you’re in the plans that you were just referencing on the supplement side, where let’s say you’ve got a monthly premium of $150 a month, and then you know what the deductible is going to be, like we can start to build those numbers into the monthly paycheck that we’re going to be receiving during retirement, essentially paying ourselves or if we’re on an advantage plan, and let’s just say there’s an advantage plan with the example you gave where there’s a zero-dollar premium, but we know what the out of pocket match your limit is, like, okay, we need planning for that, right, or planning for some of the other expected expenses from cost sharing of the healthcare. 

You can really start to see how and understanding of the options and the plans and what the impact could be annually, as well as monthly when you talk about something like a monthly premium, could build into the financial plan, build into building that retirement paycheck as we make that transition into that phase. 

[0:17:56] JW: Yeah, exactly. 

[0:17:58] TU: All right. Number five, Josh. This is one that I didn’t think about that was really interesting when you were talking about this in our preparation for the show. With some of the variances between the plans, when it comes to things like dental, vision, hearing, or the extras, tell us more here. 

[0:18:14] JW: When it comes to dental, vision and hearing, this is becoming a much bigger issue, I would say than it used to be. I’ve been doing this for several years now, and back when I started, folks weren’t that concerned about dental, vision, hearing. However, advertisements on TV, the mail that folks are getting that are turning 65 heavily focuses on this side of things. Medicare Advantage plans are going to include dental vision and hearing benefits, as well as other things too, like over-the-counter items, allowances that the plans give people several dollars a month that they are a quarter rather than they can use to buy Tylenol or Advil or Band-Aids and Toothpaste, that kind of stuff. 

Advantage plans are going to include those kinds of things. Again, it’s usually at no additional cost. Even a zero-dollar plan would include these things. Whereas Medicare supplements do not include any of these kinds of things, but you can buy them separately, just like you buy the Part D, separately. You can pick up dental vision hearing benefits at an additional cost if you’d like them. 

[0:19:17] TU: Josh, before we wrap up by talking about some of the common mistakes that you’re seeing, folks making when it comes to evaluating benefit options and selecting a policy. Summarize here for us the five points that we just talked about as, again, individuals may either be choosing their own policy, working with a family member or working with patients that they can take away this information. 

[0:19:36] JW: Yeah. The easy way that I like to describe it is this. If you go with a Medicare Advantage plan, this is going to be your less expensive route to take. It’s going to include Medicare Part D. It’s going to include dental vision hearing. However, you are going to have a network and you are going to have medical bills along the way as you use it. Medicare supplements are your more expensive route to take. They don’t include drug coverage. They don’t include dental, vision, hearing, although you can buy them separately if you’d like. However, you don’t have the medical bills and you don’t have the network to be concerned with. 

If you’re a pharmacist out there and you’re trying to quickly explain this to a patient, maybe just go about it that way. Medicare Advantage is less expensive. There’s a network and there’s medical bills. Supplement is more expensive, but it doesn’t have a network and it doesn’t have medical bills. 

[0:20:29] TU: Great summary, Josh. I’m curious, like rough numbers. What do you see as like a distribution between these two buckets as you work with those going into Medicare enrollment? 

[0:20:39] JW: Yeah. That is a great question. That’s one that’s become very common as my clients are sitting down trying to make a decision on what they want to go with. I’m finding now, Tim, and it didn’t used to be this way, that it is about a 60-40 split. About 60% are going the Advantage plan side and about 40% are going the supplement side. When I first started, it was probably 70-30 the other way or heavily weighted on the supplement. 

I think one of the big reasons for this is the marketing. Advantage plans are much more heavily marketed to people who are new to Medicare. I said before, a lot of people think that they are the only option. Not that they’re a bad option, but again, folks are just having much more education, getting much more education about Advantage plans than they are supplements. 

[0:21:32] TU: Let’s talk about that marketing because I think that’s one of maybe a little bit too harsh to call it a mistake, but I think the influence of the marketing can be real. I’ve seen many of these commercials, Josh. I think I know the ones you’re referring to and just the impact that whether it’s mail marketing, TV, radio, a combination of can have and sway in someone in one direction or another. Tell us more about that. Even some of the other common mistakes you may see folks making when they’re going through the selection process. 

[0:22:03] JW: Yeah. Those commercials are becoming very popular. We’re talking about like the Joe name, this commercials guys that you can’t help but see, especially getting here into the fall into annual enrollment. Those commercials, the mistakes I see people making is buying a plan based off of what they’re seeing just on those commercials alone. If you actually pay attention to one of them, they are referencing primarily the perks of the plans. 

The dental, vision, hearing benefits, they may even say things like call and check your zip code, because you could get a plan where you don’t have to pay for your Medicare premium and at all. The plan will pay for it for you. In my opinion, those aren’t the only things you should factor in when you’re buying health insurance. You should factor in other things too, like does your doctor take the plan? That’s a pretty big one. 

Yeah, you might have a nice dental benefit, but when you need to go to your primary care physician and they say, “No, we don’t take this.” How valuable is that dental benefit now? Other things, folks don’t necessarily consider, especially on, and we can get into this more if you’d like, but these relatively new to the game Part B, give back plans that pay some or all of your Medicare premium. You got to think from an insurance company’s perspective, if they’re willing to pay your Medicare premium for you, what do you think that’s going to say about the benefits they’re going to provide in the plan? 

[0:23:31] TU: Yeah. 

[0:23:32] TU: Primarily translates to higher medical bills to you. These are just things that I feel like are important for people to consider that you’re buying a health insurance plan, you want it to be solid when you need it. You don’t necessarily want to buy a plan, because it gives you $100 every quarter and over-the-counter items limit. Those are some of the mistakes I see people making. They buy a plan based off of perks, not necessarily on the day-to-day usage of the plan that could be more important. 

[0:24:04] TU: Yeah. Which is, it’s a different form of marketing, right? It’s not necessarily a commercial, but it’s a different form of marketing to hook someone into a policy. That’s a good a good call out. I think both of those Josh, to me highlight the value and you showed me that worksheet, that side-by-side worksheet of, “Hey, we’re looking at supplement plans, we’re looking at advantage plans.” We’re applying somebody’s personal situation. You’re sitting down with them one-on-one, talking through the benefits and the options. 

That really brings the life to me, the value that an agent, especially someone specializing in Medicare, such as yourself can be helping, whether it’s the person directly that’s selecting the benefits, whether it’s family members that are involved, or for our pharmacist community, again, especially those working in community practice. I know these questions come up all the time in terms of, “Hey, I’m a patient, I go to the pharmacy, I ask my pharmacist about the policy or what should I be thinking.” 

My question here is your work is obviously in Ohio. If we have pharmacists in Northeast Ohio, shout out to Josh, get connected with him for sure as well, but much of our listeners may be across the country. So, words that you would have to share in terms of what are some things that folks can look for in trying to develop a relationship with an agent as a pharmacist or for those that are looking to select a policy for themselves or a family member and partnering with an agent that way, as well. 

[0:25:23] JW: Yeah. I mean, first of all, from the pharmacist’s perspective, I do work with several pharmacists and chains and whatnot. I would say from your perspective, don’t feel like you need to be the expert on Medicare Part D, specifically. You can say, “Hey, I don’t know all the answers on what plan you should pick, but here’s a guy you can call, or here’s a girl you can call, they know. They do this for a living.” The other thing too, guys, is it saves you time. 

I mean, I see, I’m in and out of pharmacies a lot. I see how busy you are. I can imagine how stressful it is when you have 10 or 20 prescriptions you need to fill and somebody asks to go into the private room and say, “Hey, what prescription drug plan is going to be best for me next year?” It can just take up a lot of a lot of time I would imagine. Again, having an agent you can refer to, to handle those questions for you would save you a lot of time and alleviate that pressure of having to feel like an expert. 

[0:26:26] TU: Yeah. Well, this was great, Josh. I really appreciate you coming on the show sharing your expertise. As I mentioned at the beginning, it’s been a long time in the making covering the topic we haven’t done much about before. We will link in the show notes. Josh’s LinkedIn profile, email. If folks have questions, as well as a link to the insurance firm that he works with right now. So, you can check all that information out in the show notes. Josh, thanks so much again for coming on. I really appreciate it. 

[0:26:51] JW: Yeah. Thanks for having me, Tim. Go Bills. 

[0:26:53] TU: That’s all. This is the year. Let’s do it. 

[0:26:55] JW: This is the year, Tim. It’s the year. 

[0:26:57] TU: Awesome. Thanks, man. 

[0:26:58] JW: Yup. 

[0:26:59] TU: Before we wrap up today’s episode of the Your Financial Pharmacists podcast, I want to again thank our sponsor, the American Pharmacists Association. APHA is every pharmacist ally advocating on your behalf for better working conditions, fair PBM practices, and more opportunities for pharmacists to provide care. Make sure to join a bolder APHA to gain premier access to financial educational resources and to receive discounts on YFP products and services. You can join APHA at a 25% discount by visiting pharmacist.com/join and using the coupon code YFP. Again, that’s pharmacist.com forward slash join using the coupon code YFP. 

[DISCLAIMER]

[0:27:39] TU: As we conclude this week’s podcast, an important reminder that the content on this show is provided to you for informational purposes only and is not intended to provide and should not be relied on for investment or any other advice. Information in the podcast and corresponding material should not be construed as a solicitation or offer to buy or sell any investment or related financial products. We urge listeners to consult with a financial advisor with respect to any investment.

Furthermore, the information contained in our archived newsletters, blog posts and podcasts is not updated and may not be accurate at the time you listen to it on the podcast. Opinions and analyses expressed herein are solely those of Your Financial Pharmacists, unless otherwise noted, and constitute judgments as of the dates published. Such information may contain forward-looking statements, which are not intended to be guarantees of future events. Actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements.

For more information, please visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/disclaimer. Thank you again for your support of the Your Financial Pharmacist Podcast. Have a great rest of your week.

[END]

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YFP 328: How to Navigate Open Enrollment & Employer Benefits


Tim Baker, CFP, RICP, RLP joins Tim Ulbrich, PharmD to discuss open enrollment & evaluating employer benefits.

Episode Summary

This week on the podcast, Tim Ulbrich, PharmD sits down with YFP co-owner and Director of Financial Planning, Tim Baker, CFP, RICP, RLP to discuss open enrollment and the process of evaluating employer benefits. They discuss considerations for choosing a health insurance plan, how to determine whether or not your employer-provided life and disability insurance is sufficient, the differences between an FSA, Dependent Care FSA, and HSA, and what to be looking for when putting money into your employer-sponsored retirement plan.

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode

Episode Transcript

Tim Ulbrich: Tim, glad to have you back on the show.

Tim Baker: Yeah, good to be here, Tim. Looking forward to getting into open enrollment discussion. ‘Tis the season. So yeah, I’m ready for it.

Tim Ulbrich: ‘Tis the season indeed. Fall is in the air officially here in Ohio, which does mean it’s almost time for open enrollment and ensuring that we’re taking the time to understand and maximize employer benefits. And I think whether someone is reviewing their benefits for the first time, whether that’s accepting a new position, going through another round of open enrollment, a lot to consider here, including insurance, retirement accounts and HSAs, FSAs, to name a few. So Tim, our team at YFP Planning includes employer benefits as a part of the planning process, perhaps an area that folks don’t necessarily associate working with their financial planner on. So how does this part, employer benefits, factor into the financial plan? And why is it so important that we’re looking at it in the planning process?

Tim Baker: Yeah, I think this is another area, Tim, where like when we say, “comprehensive,” we mean comprehensive. And it’s just like kind of the same conversation with things like home purchase. Most financial advisors are not going to kind of walk you through kind of the A-Z of buying a home because most of the time, a financial advisor is working with people in their 50s, 60s, 70s, right? And the reason for that is because those are the people that have assets, and that’s how they charge their fee. We have many, many, many clients that are in their 20s and 30s. And things like home purchase is really important and is often a big step in their financial journey and their financial plan. So we kind of take the time to go through that based on, I know you’ve said it, I’ve said it, we’ve messed those transactions up in the past, and we just don’t want to see our clients do the same thing. So open enrollment is kind of the same thing. A lot of financial advisors don’t really talk about this stuff because if you’re working with people in their 50s, 60s, like they’ve done it dozens of times, right? So they’ve gone through this. And a lot of our clients haven’t. You know, it’s not something that is kind of what we understand. And so to define open enrollment, open enrollment is the period of time where you can purchase or apply for health insurance for the upcoming year without a qualifying event. And usually a qualifying event is something like a marriage or a divorce or a birth of a child. So it’s typically very centered on the health insurance plan because that’s the big piece of the benefits. But then what the employer does is kind of have you opt out of other benefits that they might offer, which might be life insurance, disability, I’ve even seen things like pet insurance and things like that. You know, some things that are not insurance-related could be like a legal benefit. So that’s what this is is open enrollment. And it’s important because your employer benefits are a major component of your compensation package. And you know, this is kind of the conversation that goes back to things like salary negotiation is I’ve seen clients, they’ll say, “Hey, I’m making $110,000,” and they get an offer for $120,000 but they take a major step back with regard to their total compensation because of the benefits that are associated with that. I think it’s really important to understand what the employer benefits are and how to assess that. So that’s really what’s at stake here is really understanding that piece. And we know this, Tim, because when we plan to hire someone, we know that it’s not just about the salary pay. We apply a multiple on top of that because we know that the benefits that we’re going to provide for the employee are going to be above and beyond that. So that total cost or what I would say is an investment in that person is really beyond the salary. So this is what is really that bell to that. We’re trying to assess an an employee to say, OK, how can I best optimize this part of my compensation. And I would say that there is a lot, you know, a lot of people that don’t necessarily fully optimize this part of their financial plan or give it the attention that it needs because it sneaks up on us or bad information or what have you. So that’s really kind of the overall picture here of what it is and why it’s important.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and Tim, I think when you say sneaks up on us, bad information, it’s important I think for folks, basic stuff before we jump into individual benefits, you know, know your dates, obviously what’s the time span. You know, a lot of employers, depending on how they organize this, will do informational sessions, open Q&As, one-on-ones, group, and some of that might be automated, depending on the system and the platform they’re using. But making sure, understanding the dates, you know, simple things, how much time do you have if you’re going to be on vacation, things like that, making sure you can coordinate with HR. And then also, you know, just taking a look at your pay stub and your benefits. What do you currently have? And really taking a pulse on — and I think just a chance to go back and what’s gross pay, what’s net pay, what’s coming out in benefits, and taking this time that comes around every year as a chance to revisit some of these things that we want to be looking at often. And then of course, just thinking about upcoming changes, right, that might be happening. You know, I think of things like children that might be beneficiaries on the healthcare side, aging out if you think about 26 or folks that might be expecting or perhaps getting married, things that might have an impact on their benefits, considering those things as you’re in the benefits selection. And then of course just refreshing and updating the evaluation of who are the beneficiaries that are listed on certain policies. Tim, I want to start with health insurance. You know, I think it’s the one that typically carries the biggest price tag as we think about it relative to the other insurance and typically carries more options than things like dental and vision and life and disability, which I think for many employers it’s more of a one-way type of option. So the big question here is how do I determine which one to get? And of course, all plans are created differently but when folks are looking at these and you’re evaluating the deductibles and maximum out-of-pockets and premiums and copays and coinsurance, unfortunately, it’s a system that even though our audience is comfortable with all of those numbers because they live in it in the job that they’ve done or have been trained in it previously, there’s just a lot to consider. And if you look at plans, let’s consider a three-tiered plan where you’ve got like a bronze, silver, gold option, you know, you’re looking at OK, less out of pocket, more out of pocket, better coverage, but perhaps I could have lower out of pocket and I could use that money elsewhere. Like general framework, how do you begin to help clients think through this decision and not just look at it in a silo but also consider it in the context of the rest of the plan?

Tim Baker: Yeah, so I think it’s — you know, everyone can say it with me — it depends, right? So you know, I think a lot of it depends on past history or — you know, you mentioned a few things like what’s kind of on the horizon? Is it getting married or having kids? And some of those will allow you to kind of elect insurance outside of the open enrollment period. But those are typically qualifying events. But you know, an example is when we had Liam, when Shea was pregnant with Liam, we opted out of the bronze package, you know, the HSA plan to more of a gold package because we knew that the doctor bills and the hospital bills were going to be there. Our thought process was, you know, although in most cases we’re not going to the doctor a lot, you know, during a normal year, well, electing to a higher deductible plan, which means less coming out of our paycheck but then when we do go to the doctor, there’s going to be potentially more coming out of our pocket. So we did that to get in front of it a little bit. And you know, that’s really important from a planning perspective and kind of mitigating as much of the costs — and we probably saved ourselves if we did the math $1,000 by doing that. So that’s an important part of the plan. Now, sometimes things are going to come up and you’re just not going to — you know, it’s kind of like that emergency fund. You’re just not going to know for the future. But I would say is it’s a little bit of an exercise in looking at your past history, so looking at how often you’re going to the doctor and how often you’re reaching into your pocket to pay for things like copays and things like that. But then also projecting it forward, so that’s kind of where the conversation starts is that, you know, if you’re a younger, healthy professional and you’re not really going to the doctor, then you probably should really consider kind of a bronze, high-deductible, HDHP plan and couple that with the HSA, which we’ve said is a great forum to stash dollars. If you’re looking at regular doctor visits because of a chronic issue or something like that, that’s not going to be for you, regardless of your age. You just know that you’re going to be in and out of the doctor’s office. So I think it’s really looking at, again, kind of the budget and seeing what money has been spent on healthcare costs in the past and then what you think, project those going forward. And like I said, like this is not — it’s important, but these are taking it like snapshots one year at a time. So you can — like after Liam was born and the medical expenses were gone, then we went back to the high-deductible plan with the HSA. So I think it’s really important to kind of take stock of kind of your history, your medical history, your spending on healthcare, to form the baseline of your decision in that realm. The other comment I would make, Tim, is not all 401k’s are created equal. And as many of us know, not all health plans are created equal. So some are really, really great, and some are really, really terrible. And sometimes, that has to do with the size of the organization, sometimes the economies to scale, the bigger that you are, the less that each participant pays, whether that’s the 401k or the health insurance plan. So you kind of have to work with the sandbox, you know, that you’re playing in, so to speak, and something that can be very much out of your control.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I think, Tim, your example of Liam is a great reminder of not putting open enrollment on auto pilot.

Tim Baker: Yeah.

Tim Ulbrich: And I think that’s what we’re trying to stress here is like, using this as a chance to re-evaluate each year, you know, what happened last year? What worked last year may or may not be what makes sense for this year for a variety of reasons. And I think this is certainly a place where we want to be evaluating what does the cash position look like? What does the reserves look like? And how do we feel about that? Especially if we’re going to be opting into a high-deductible health plan, you know, thinking worst case scenario — hopefully never happens — looking at those out-of-pocket maxes and really asking yourself, how comfortable are we with that happening? How does that make us feel? And could we weather that storm if it were to come?

Tim Baker: Yeah, and you know, and we’ve had some tough conversations with clients that are deep in credit card debt and they really need as much of their income to kind of like right the ship and get going, so sometimes it means sacrificing or being uncomfortable here. You know, one of the things I look at is like if we look at all the debts that are out there, medical debt is not necessarily a bad debt in terms of like they reformed a lot of things with it hurting your credit because it’s kind of been a nightmare, you’re typically not gouged with higher interest rates and things like that. So typically more forgiven. I would even say push back on a lot of medical debt because it’s wrong. I think Tim, you had a story about that when one of your sons was born. So there’s a little bit more give I would say than some of these other ones that goes like right to collections and you’re in a lot of trouble. So it’s kind of — this is all about like mitigating the risk and trying to understand where can we give a little bit so we’re OK.

Tim Ulbrich: I want to shift gears, Tim, to life and disability. Probably one of the most common questions that we get is, do I need to purchase additional life and disability insurance beyond what my employer covers? And of course the answer is it depends on a large part of the individual’s situation and what they have going on and what they’re trying to do with those policies and so forth. But you know, general thoughts and discussion on how one goes about making this decision in terms of understanding what coverage is there from an employer standpoint, determining what total coverage may be needed, and some of the gap and differences between an employer plan and if they purchased a policy out on the open market.

Tim Baker: I think if we look at most pharmacists out there, you know, professionals that are making a six-figure salary, I think there’s going to come a time when there probably is a need to purchase policies outside of what the employer provides. Now, the problem with the financial services industry is that a lot of “financial advisors” are trying to push those policies on a young professional when they probably don’t need them. That’s when you’re a pharmacist that has maybe six figures of debt that’s going to be forgiven if you die or are disabled with no dependents and really, you know, not much on your balance sheet. So there’s kind of like this gap of do I really need this? Or can I just make do with what my employer provides? I’ll say this about the employer-provided policies: Outside of health insurance, which is a health plan, I would say that things like life and disability insurance are not plans. They’re really perks. So they’re meant to supplement or meant to provide some type of benefit that will help the employee but also it’s a way to kind of retain you and things like that. So I really view these as perks and not necessarily plans. I would say, to your point, Tim, I think it’s really looking at the individual and say OK, does it make sense to buy a policy outside of that? Most employers will provide some type of life insurance benefit, whether it’s something like $50,000 or one or two times income, which you can then elect to either increase your coverage or not. I think the downside of that is, you know, if you’re working for an employer as a 30-year-old and you have all of your eggs in that basket and you’re saying, “Hey, I have $1 million” or a lot of times, they’re capped. Most times, pharmacists need a lot more than what their employer can provide. So that’s one of the drawbacks. But if you’re working with that company for 40 years and then you leave to go to another organization, which maybe that isn’t provided or it’s a lot less of a benefit, you have a gap, then you’re going out in the market 10 years older where you’re paying a lot more for that particular policy. So that’s one of the things that — sometimes they’re portable, meaning that you can take them with you, and sometimes they’re not. So for both the life and disability, you know, it’s really looking at your own situation. Just like open enrollment itself, this is one of the things that often overlooked, just insurance. And I know we’ve probably done a podcast in the past about what’s proper life and disability and things like that.

Tim Ulbrich: Yep.

Tim Baker: For the disability, the coverage is typically going to be a percentage of your income. And again, it could be capped, and some employers will offer both long-term and short-term disability. You know, both are great. But you know, oftentimes, because of one reason or another, there’s going to be a gap in the coverage either because of taxes or just that a pharmacist, what they make and what most professionals will say that you need to kind of cover down and typically, that can be anywhere from 50-80% of what your income is, that there is a need to go out onto the open market and buy individual policies. But from an open enrollment perspective, I think if you don’t have those policies, it’s really important to understand, you know, what is there for you? And what can at least tide you over until you get those policies in place? And again, it’s one of those things where it’s like, it’s not important to you until it’s important to you. And it’s really hard to kind of, to show that to clients unless they’ve experienced that pain themselves or a close family member.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah.

Tim Baker: But it’s going to be a really important piece of protecting the overall financial plan, which is — this is really what this is all about is, you know, insurance is really protecting the financial plan from a catastrophic event and ensuring that you can continue to build wealth and survive into the future.

Tim Ulbrich: Episode 044, Tim, How to Determine Life Insurance Needs, 045, How to Determine Disability Insurance Needs, two that we’ll link to in the show notes. We’ve got more information on the website as well, YourFinancialPharmacist.com. Tim, I think one of the common mistakes I see made here just relating to that discussion on gap in coverage is not digging into the policies to really understand, you know, life insurance is maybe the most obvious example where if you have a policy — if you have a need for life insurance and you have a term policy that’s offered for $50,000 or $100,000 or one times salary or two times salary, typically, those have a cap on them. For many folks, there’s going to be a gap and a shortage. And I think this is where, you know, sitting down one-on-one with someone to really calculate the total need, think about the transferability issues that you mentioned and what does it mean if you pick up employment, tax considerations, and really getting into the weeds of some of the nuances of the policies and things like own occupation, we’ve talked about that before and its importance. And again, thinking about how this fits in with the rest of the plan. And just a shoutout here to our fee-only financial planning team at YFP Planning, this is really where I think the value of fee-only comes in in that really sitting down with someone to determine what is their true need in their best interests. Not too much coverage that there’s dollars being spent that could be put elsewhere in the financial plan, but making sure we’re also not exposing the plan to unnecessary risk.

Tim Baker: Yeah, I mean, you know, this — what we’re talking about here are products. Like insurance is a product. So any time that you talk about dispensing a device, “Hey, Tim, you need life insurance,” and you say, “OK, great. Like where do I get it?” Like we can sell you this product. There’s going to be a conflict of interest. So having someone that is a fee-only fiduciary that is not further enriched by the advice that they’re giving, you know, strips away a lot of that, well, am I being advised in my best interests or in the advisor’s best interests, the one that’s advising me. So that’s I think the beauty of fee-only.

Tim Ulbrich: One example I just want to give here, I just pulled up, Tim, our long-term disability coverage that we added recently for the YFP team.

Tim Baker: Yeah.

Tim Ulbrich: And you know, if you look at it on kind of the main benefits platform, it says, “60% monthly income up to $6,000.” But this is an example where digging deeper is so valuable. You know, you get into things like what is the definition of earnings? So our policy, it’s base wage. So how you’re compensated could have an impact here.

Tim Baker: Yep.

Tim Ulbrich: What’s the elimination period or the timeframe from when the disability happens to when the benefit starts to pay out? Here, it’s 90 days. But if it’s shorter than that, perhaps longer than that, what’s the game plan to fund. Does it have own occupation coverage? We’ve talked about the importance of that before. What’s the maximum benefit? Our policy goes up to age 65. And then things like coverage restrictions, other incentives. So really, just a reminder of this time period and using this point here to really dig into this information and read the policies.

Tim Baker: Yeah, you know, and again, going back to those episodes you mentioned there, that’s where we kind of talk about the nitty-gritty, but I think the beautiful thing about this is like when we’re reviewing this and we kind of look at the — kind of go through the open enrollment optimization stuff is like as a planner, I’m looking at your balance sheet. So I’m like, alright, does it make sense to bolster — you know, because a lot of these, you can opt in. So like our policy doesn’t do this, but a lot of policies, they’ll say, “The employer pays for a 60% benefit of your earnings.” But then you can opt in to get that up to 80%. So you pay an additional — you pay out of pocket out of your paycheck for that additional 20%. If I’m looking at your balance sheet, Tim, and I’m saying, “Man, you have plenty of cash,” I would say, “Let’s not opt into that.” Or we might say, “Let’s do it,” because we know because the employer is going to pay for it, that that benefit’s going to be taxed.

Tim Ulbrich: Yep.

Tim Baker: If the employer pays for the benefit, it’s going to be taxed. That’s the gap. You know, so the idea is looking at your situation and overlaying what’s out there. I think the open enrollment, what I say is we want to look at the things that you’re paying for and say, does it make sense for you to be paying for it? I see a lot of AD&D insurance, and I kind of look at this as like — and again, this is not advice — but I kind of look at those as like when you buy something at Best Buy and they ask you about the warranty. You know, most of the time, you say no because it’s just not worth the money. Some of these things in open enrollment, it’s the same thing. It’s like AD&D, for those to pay out is very rare. So even if it’s $2 per pay period, I’m like, I just don’t think it’s worth it. So we’re trying to make sure that you’re not paying for things that don’t necessarily provide you much benefit, much utility. But then you are paying for things that do. And you know, kind of finding that Venn diagram of sorts to make sure that, again, we’re fully optimized with regard to this part of your compensation package.

Tim Ulbrich: AD&D, for folks that are wondering, Accidental Death & Dismemberment insurance.

Tim Baker: Oh yeah. Yep.

Tim Ulbrich: Tim Baker dropping some financial lingo here.

Tim Baker: Sorry about that. Yeah.

Tim Ulbrich: Tim, next I want to talk about FSAs, dependent care FSAs, especially since we’ve had some changes that have happened there as well as HSAs. And we’ve talked probably among these to the greatest extent, we’ve talked about HSAs because of the value of what that can provide as well as these other options. And we’ve talked about it on the podcast, we’ve got some blog posts, Episode 165, The Power of a Health Savings Account, also have an article on the blog, which we’ll link to, about really more of the strategic investing side of an HSA if you’re able to do that. So Tim, high level overview, FSA, dependent care FSA, HSA, and some of the differences and considerations for these accounts.

Tim Baker: The very crude way that I remember the difference between FSA and HSA is FSAs are really use-or-lose. So when you fund these with pre-tax dollars, if you don’t use those monies for the purposes of healthcare for an FSA for healthcare or dependent care for a dependent care FSA, you lose it. So it’s F-udge. Like I don’t get — you don’t get to use that money. Whereas the HSA, this is — can potentially be an accrual account, meaning that year over year, you can stack Benjamins and hopefully one day becomes that kind of stealth IRA that we talk about that has that triple tax benefit. So like I said, we’ve talked about the HSA ad nauseum. It has to be paired with a high-deductible health plan. You know, you can put the money in. It has a triple tax benefit, which means it goes in pre-tax, it grows tax-free so you can invest it like an IRA, and then you can distribute it in the near term for approved medical costs or when you reach a certain age, you can use it basically for whatever. So that’s the beauty of the HSA. But you know, again, it only works or you only have access to it when it’s paired with a high-deductible health plan. The FSA for healthcare is similar, but very different. So you’re allowed to use — you’re allowed to fund it with pre-tax dollars, meaning if you make $100,000 and you put $1,000 in there, you’re taxed on as if $99,000. So I think the limits for FSA for 2021, I think it’s like $2,750.

Tim Ulbrich: That’s right. Yep.

Tim Baker: Yeah. So the idea is that what you’re trying to do here — it’s a little bit of a game of chicken. So what you’re trying to do is really, again, see into the future and say, “OK, what do I know is a baseline that I’m going to use on my out-of-pocket healthcare expenses?” And if you know for sure that you’re going to spending $2,000 on that, then you should fund it with $2,000. And typically, there is a little bit of give at the end of the year where you can either carry some over or you have some time into the New Year to use it on.

Tim Ulbrich: Two months or —

Tim Baker: Yeah. And every plan is going to be different in its design. So you might be loading up on kind of some of the over-the-counter stuff. I’ve had a client buy a bunch of stuff for like contacts and things like that. So it’s going to be really important to kind of — again, this goes back to the spending plan, the budget, to understand what have you been spending in the past? Is that going to be indicative of what you will spend in the future? And then fund that with at least that baseline amount so you don’t lose it. The same thing can be said for the dependent care FSA. So this is a pre-tax account that you can fund that is used for care for your child who is age 13, for before- and after-school care, babysitting, nanny expenses, daycare, nursery school, preschool, summer day camp, and then also care for a spouse or a relative who is physically or mentally unable to care for themselves and lives in your home. So this money — this has actually been amended under the American Rescue Plan Act. So I think for single and married filing jointly couples, the pre-tax contribution limit went from where you could $5,000 a year, now it’s I think $10,500.

Tim Ulbrich: Significant jump. Yep.

Tim Baker: Yeah, very significant. So the higher limits apply to the plan year beginning Dec. 31, 2020 and before Jan. 1, 2022. So it is a temporary thing, but it allows you to park some dollars that you would otherwise — so if you’re in a 25% tax bracket, it’s as if you’re saving 25%, kind of thinking about it that way. So that’s what really — and for the FSAs, unlike the HSA, the FSA is — it has to be provided by the employer. I think we had a question on the Ask a YFP CFP about the HSA. And you don’t have to necessarily go through your employer. Sometimes, the employer doesn’t offer it. So you can go out and set up your own HSA. The FSA has to be provided by the employer for you to have access to it. So that’s really important. Again, these are all going to be — when you elect it, it’s going to take money out of your paycheck and basically fund these accounts for the appropriate purpose.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and this to me is where when we’ve talked with Paul Eikenberg, our director of tax, and working with our clients, one of the things he talks about here is these being untapped areas of potential.

Tim Baker: Totally.

Tim Ulbrich: And so I think there’s a lot of low-hanging fruit in the financial plan. And I think really evaluating these and perhaps the dollars of any one don’t jump out as being super significant, but I think as we start to add these up with other strategies, there certainly is value. And Tim, you had mentioned we did tackle a question recently on Ask a YFP CFP 084. The question was about fees on an HSA account, but we did talk about the opportunity to access an HSA account independent of the employer. So we’ve talked about health insurance, we’ve talked about life and disability, we’ve talked about FSAs and HSAs and dependent care FSAs. I want to wrap up our discussion by retirement saving options. And I think, again, this is an opportunity to take a step back, look at the overall progress on the investing part of the plan, overall goals, perhaps gap between the goals and where you’re currently at, and then to evaluate where does investing fit in with the rest of the financial plan. And so when we think about, Tim, employer-sponsored retirement accounts, two main buckets we have, which are those that are Roth contributions and those that are traditional. So define for us the difference between those two for folks that are — maybe have some outstanding questions about those or unsure as well as the limits of what we’re able to do in 2021.

Tim Baker: Yeah, so — and I’ll preface this by saying that most of — you know, open enrollment is a good time to check in on your retirement savings options. You’re not necessarily bound to that because you can go in —

Tim Ulbrich: Correct.

Tim Baker: — really at any time and say, “Hey, I was putting in 5%. I talked to a YFP planner, and they said I should put in 8%. That’ll put me on track to get my $5 million nest egg, so that’s what I want to do.” I can really do that at any time. Or I can say, “I want less Roth and more traditional,” or whatever the case is. So it’s just a good opportunity, it’s a good checkpoint to say, OK, where am I at and should I make any tweaks? So — and one of the things that they often do here is they allow you to put in an escalator. So you know — and you can do this any time too, but it’s a good thing to do in open enrollment so every year, you can increase that by 1% or 2% or whatever that looks like. So to answer your question, Tim, the Roth v. traditional, so most employers will offer a 401k or a 403b or if you work for the government, a TSP. So when you elect your retirement options here, a lot of them will now — you’ll have a traditional — so think of two buckets. You’ll have a traditional 401k and a Roth 401k.

Tim Ulbrich: Yep.

Tim Baker: And they’re all under the same plan, but they segregate the monies because for a traditional, these are pre-tax dollars. So that example I gave you is if you put in $1,000 into your 401k and you make $100,00 — your traditional 401k — and you make $100,000, you’re taxed as if you made $99,000. For a Roth, it’s after-tax. So same example, if you put $1,000 into your Roth 401k and you make $100,000, you are taxed as if you made $100,000 because you’re not getting that pre-tax deduction. So for these dollars, the money is either taxed going in or coming out. So for a traditional, you’re not taxed going in, but then it grows tax-free inside of that account, and then you’re taxed when it is distributed, hopefully in retirement. For the Roth 401k, you’re taxed going in, so you don’t get that deduction, but then it grows tax-free and when it comes out, it’s not taxed because it’s already been taxed going in. So a lot of people will say Roth, Roth, Roth. And again, it’s going to depend on your plan. It’s going to depend on what you’re trying to achieve. And a lot of people get this wrong as well. So this is another good check on it to make sure that you’re putting the dollars in the right spot. Your match that your employer provides, if there is a match, is always going to go into a traditional account.

Tim Ulbrich: Yep.

Tim Baker: So if there is a match, you’re going to have — some people get it twisted like, I’m 100% in my Roth 401k, but I see money in my traditional, like what gives? And I’m like, well, this is the money that your employer is matching. It’s going to go there, you know, regardless. So it’s really important, you know — so to kind of give you some numbers with 2021, to max out a 401k, a 403b, it’s $19,500. So you can put that in regardless of how much money you make. So that’s really going to be the limit for the 401k. IRAs are a completely different animal. They’re $6,000, this completely separate accounting mechanism. And that’s going to be dependent on your income whether you can put it in directly into a Roth or a traditional IRA and if you get the deduction. And I know we’ve had podcasts on that as well. But the point of this, Tim, is that the open enrollment exercise is a great opportunity to kind of just do a once-over for your retirement savings options and just make sure that one, you’re in the proper allocation but then it’s also in the Roth v. traditional, and then just making sure that you don’t get stuck in that hey, my employer matches 3%, so for 10 years, I’ve just been putting in 3%. You don’t want to do that because more often than not, it’s not going to be enough for you to retire comfortably. So this is another way to kind of check those things and push the envelope a little bit.

Tim Ulbrich: Yeah, and I point folks back to Episode 074, when we talked about evaluating your 401k plan, also more recently, Episode 208, when we talked about why minimizing fees on your investments is so important. Certainly relevant here as we talk about employer-sponsored retirement plans where we can see a lot of variabilities in those investment options and in the fees. As we’ve said a couple times now throughout the show, open enrollment is such a great time to take a step back and evaluate the financial plan. And for folks that are going through this process and think, you know, I really see the value in working with someone one-on-one to look at the financial plan holistically, to determine how to prioritize the goals, make some of these decisions around open enrollment, could be debt repayment, investing, tax evaluation, and so forth. We’d love to have a chance to talk with you about the YFP Planning comprehensive financial planning services that we conduct on a one-on-one basis. And you can learn more about those services as well as schedule a free discovery call by going to YFPPlanning.com. As always, thank you so much for listening. We hope you have a great rest of your week and look forward to having you join us again next week.

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YFP 327: Pharmacy Innovators with Dr. Natalie Park (Pharmesol)


On this segment of the Pharmacy Innovators, sponsored by Pyrls, Pharmesol co-founder & CEO Dr. Natalie Park joins host Dr. Corrie Sanders.

Episode Summary

With the rise of AI and the increasing use of technology in our daily lives, there is an opportunity to improve the pharmacy world and patient care. On this segment of the Pharmacy Innovators sponsored by Pyrls, Dr. Natalie Park, Co-founder and CEO of Pharmesol, joins host Dr. Corrie Sanders, to discuss how Pharmesol leverages technology and AI to optimize patient communication and follow-up care. Natalie shares her unconventional career path, what Pharmesol is, what inspired her and her co-founders to start it, and how it is improving patient care. She also discuss the highs and lows of starting a business before delving into the importance of value-based care, what pharmacy will look like in the future, and how we can embrace the inevitable technological changes.

About Today’s Guest

Dr. Natalie Park is a pharmacist with a background in conducting health economics and outcomes research in the pharmaceutical industry. Natalie is co-founder and CEO of Pharmesol, an automated and proactive medication assistant tool that leverages pharmacist expertise and artificial intelligence to enhance patient experience after direct interaction with the healthcare team.

Key Points From the Episode

  • Introducing Natalie Park, co-founder and CEO of Pharmesol. 
  • Natalie tells us about her studies and unconventional career path in pharmacy. 
  • The inspiration behind the creation of Pharmesol, what it is, and how it can be used in clinical practice. 
  • How Pharmesol leverages AI. 
  • The accelerator program Natalie and her co-founders did to start the business. 
  • Where she met her co-founders and how their skills differ from Natalie’s. 
  • Where Natalie was in her personal and professional life while developing Pharmesol. 
  • What she thinks pharmacy will look like in the future and how we can adjust to the technology. 
  • Natalie shares the most memorable events of her pharmaceutical career. 
  • Her favorite parts of being an entrepreneur and why she enjoys being in charge of her career.
  • Natalie shares advice for anyone contemplating a non-traditional career path.

Episode Highlights

I’m a pharmacist, but that doesn’t mean I know every single thing about every single drug.” — Dr. Natalie Park [0:06:52]

“Starting a company is really difficult. It has been very difficult. Not to say [you should] not pursue it. I do think it is a decision that takes a lot of consideration.” — Dr. Natalie Park [0:25:33]

“I’m bullish on healthcare moving towards value-based care.” — Dr. Natalie Park [0:31:11]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode

Episode Transcript

[INTRODUCTION]

[00:00:00] CR: Hi, YFP community. Corrie Sanders here, host of the Pharmacy Innovator segment of the YFP podcast. Pharmacy Innovators is designed for pharmacist navigating the entrepreneurial journey. In this series, we feature founders’ stories and strategies that help guide current and aspiring pharmacy entrepreneurs.

Today, I talk to Dr. Natalie Park, a pharmacist with a background in conducting health economics and outcomes research in the pharmaceutical industry. Natalie is co-founder and CEO of Pharmesol, an automated and proactive medication assistant tool that leverages pharmacist’s expertise and artificial intelligence to enhance patient experience after direct interaction with the healthcare team. We will discuss having honest conversations with yourself and others surrounding risk tolerance and career change. And dive into Natalie’s bullish stance on value-based care and the untapped potential within the pharmacy profession to impact health outcomes alongside technology. I know you all will be nothing short of inspired by Dr. Natalie Park.

[SPONSOR MESSAGE]

[0:01:02] JW: This is Justin Woods from the YFP team with a quick message before today’s show. If you’re tired of relying on shared passwords, or spending hundreds of dollars for drug information, we’ve got great news for you. Today’s podcast sponsor, Pyrls is changing the game for pharmacy professionals. Pyrls offers top drug summaries, clinical teaching points, a drug interaction checker, calculators, and guideline reviews all-in-one, user-friendly resource. They also recently added a free weekly quizzes to test your pharmacotherapy knowledge. Whether you’re on your web browser or accessing the mobile app, Pyrls has got you covered. Visit pyrls.com. That’s P-Y-R-L-S .com to get access to more than 25 free pharmacotherapy charts to get you started. Upgrade your drug information resources today with Pyrls. Don’t miss out on this game changing resource.

[INTERVIEW]

[0:01:56] CS: So Natalie, we are so excited to have you on the YFP podcast this morning. We will start with a really easy question of how you got into pharmacy and where you went to pharmacy school. So just tell us a little bit about your pharmacy background.

[0:02:10] NP: Yes, sure. I went to Ohio State for pharmacy school. So I actually came to the states when I was 15. I didn’t speak much English at the time, and I’m not even sure if I had insurance, to be honest, because I was an international student. So I was young, so I don’t think I knew kind of much what was going on with insurance and medical side of things. One day, I remember getting this allergic rash, which I’ve never experienced before in my life. Then I kind of freaked out, and then I went to the pharmacy. Then I showed the pharmacist kind of my rash, and then I remember asking like, “Oh, what am I supposed to do?” And then they helped me out. So that was kind of one of the reasons that inspired me to go to pharmacy school, and I went to Ohio State for both my bachelor’s and pharmacy school.

[0:03:05] CS: Love it. So firsthand experience threw you into the profession. Tell us about a little bit of your training after graduation. So you’ve kind of been on a non-traditional career path, it seems. Since graduation, you’ve done a lot in industry, so tell the listeners a little bit about that path and some of the jobs that you had, or residency training, or postgraduate training after graduation.

[0:03:27] NP: After pharmacy school, I did an industry fellowship in health economics and outcomes research. I had already taken some statistics, and epidemiology classes while I was in pharmacy school, and had some internship experience. Then my post-doc fellowship was at University of Maryland, as well as Novartis. So I did develop budget impact model, cost effectiveness models, when there is a new drug launch to take to payers, as well as using EHR and claims data to do comparative effectiveness research. Then, I went to a health system called Geisinger. First, I worked in their innovation department doing vendor assessment of digital health companies, developing internal business cases, as well as implementing subpopulation health solutions. Then I had an opportunity to move to their pharmacy department where I worked with different service lines, urology, dermatology, primary care, these different departments on the topic of medication management and optimization.

[0:04:38] CS: Wow, that is amazing. So quite a different career paths than I think the average pharmacist would probably think of when they think of one of the options within the profession. So it’s amazing, I mean, you’re working with big organizations just right out of the bat with really high-level thinking with outcomes and clinical decision support tool research, it seems. So kind of a broad-based business knowledge, just based on your years of experience in these innovation departments and working really from just a high-level perspective point of view. I’m sure you took a lot of things away from your previous job experience when you shifted into Pharmesol.

Tell us about the development of Pharmesol. Was there a certain situation where something happened and this business model came to light? Where did the inspiration from the business come from?

[0:05:30] NP: Yeah, I think if I think back, it was few different experiences coming together. Because I was working with the pharmacy team and different clinicians at a health system about the topic of medication management. I just naturally were thinking a lot about medication management, and how can we really improve the status quo, like that was my job. One of the things that I found challenging was that my colleagues, even though they were really motivated to help their patients, because they knew how much help their patients needed, but they didn’t have a lot of time. So that sort of became a challenge over and over again, in different implementation processes.

So I just had this realization and thought in mind that like, wow, the clinical capacity, lack of clinical capacity is such a problem. This may not sound that insightful, but I think it’s really different if you experienced this yourself, like every day, and this is kind of what I’m fighting against every day. So I had that thought on one hand, and then I actually had a poor experience as a patient myself. I always tell people, I’m a pharmacist, but that doesn’t mean I know every single thing about every single drug. I went to a doctor and then got some medication and I didn’t get any instruction about how to use it from the doctor or the pharmacists where I picked up the medication. And then, I came home, and I was like, “Wait, actually, I have a question.” Then I was like, “Wow, this like really sucks.”

Then the third experience is, like kind of during this time, I was – I’ve actually been working on masters for computer science. So as part of this, I built a recommender system. This is kind of the engine that drives kind of personalized recommendation that you experience in Amazon or Netflix. That kind of really made me think about my experience as a consumer, outside of healthcare is actually pretty good. I feel like these systems know me, knows what to recommend for me. I mean, apart from recommendations, just my experience as a consumer. So why can’t we do that in healthcare, is another thought that kind of – that I was having, and a combination of these different thoughts was a big motivator and I think kind of origin story for Pharmesol.

[0:08:20] CS: That’s wonderful, kind of not a three-pronged approach, but certainly three different tiers to the approach and the development of the company. Tell us, and know that you’re talking to an audience of pharmacists that intimately understands the pain points of the profession. What is Pharmesol, and how can it be used in clinical practice? Kind of break that down for us.

[0:08:43] NP: Yes, Pharmesol is a conversational AI. It’s an automated and proactive medication assistant, that enables healthcare organizations to provide high-quality, personalized support for patients through SMS text messages. So the experience for the patient is a little bit like maybe talking to a pharmacist to some degree about like calming counseling points, right? Like, “Hey, I missed a dose. What do I do?” or “I don’t know how to use this injection.” We’ve been working with a primary care clinic, where we white-label this solution. So patients when they get up, medication prescribed at the clinic. After they leave, we send a text message to say, “Hey, have you been able to pick up this medication?” Then, patients either say yes or no, and a lot of patients say no for a variety of reasons. 

Then, we help them troubleshoot. “Okay, tell me more what is the issue.” Some patients are like, “I’m just waiting for delivery” or we have some patients say, “Wait. What? I didn’t even realize I was supposed to be taking this medication.” So that’s kind of an opportunity for med rec, or another patient who said, like, “Oh, actually, I lost a third bottle of my pills, so I haven’t been taking it.” Except, that patient didn’t reach out to the clinic, or the doctor, and they – but they weren’t taking it, and they only told us because we proactively asked this question. So we help them troubleshoot, and then give them education, and then patients also have a line of communication where they can ask questions.

[0:10:24] CS: So kind of really expanding upon the preferred mechanism of communication for a lot of patients, which is text messages. But instead of just saying, “Hey, your prescription is ready.” It’s really taking it to the next level of different counseling points, and making sure it’s a comprehensive follow-up process, and putting this all in the palm of the patient through a text message. So what’s happening on the end of Pharmesol, just so that people can get a complete picture from the consumer standpoint? And then what’s happening behind the scenes? Is this a live-generated chat? Are we using an integration of AI and different mechanisms of literature analysis? What’s really going into the output that the patient ultimately receives?

[0:11:11] NP: Yeah, we’re leveraging AI, and also, we’re training this to say, “Okay, this is the accurate information about this medication, and this is not.” Essentially, don’t lie, don’t make things up.” So how we do that is we hire currently practicing clinical pharmacists to develop our content and what it can say. That is why, of course, it cannot, of course, replace humans, as mentioned, like it can answer, “This is the storage instruction” or “This is how you can use the information” or ask follow-up questions of, “Okay. What is kind of challenging for you?”

Then we also ask questions like, “Have you missed any doses?” What is kind of the reason you missed these doses?” These are the information that pharmacists are looking for to be able to make medical decision making. Okay, maybe this dosage form is right for them or not, or they’re struggling with this. So this is kind of further education, “I want to give” or “I want to have further conversation.” 

But instead of them kind of taking the time to ask these questions, we have the conversation with patients. And then we bring those actionable insights to pharmacists, so then they can really do the high-cognitive task, and make this medical decision making, and then make any adjustments to the treatment, if necessary.

[0:12:46] CS: So really streamlining to use a clinical skill set and a clinical knowledge base, and then leaving the lower-level questions, so to speak to the AI tool. Am I understanding that correctly?

[0:12:59] NP: Yeah, yeah. I think another advantage is, unfortunately, there’s just limited clinical capacity. What I see today happening is, some patients get a lot of support that they need, some patients get no support. I guess, sort of – as relatively healthy, young kind of person as me, pharma health system or the clinic, like the pharmacists are not likely going to reach out to me and ask, “Hey, Natalie. How are you doing? Are you nauseous? Are you feeling dizzy?” I’m not going to kind of be the type to get these questions. 

What our solution enables healthcare organizations to do is actually provide this high-quality care to every single one of their patients, and do the follow-up. We can tell the pharmacist, hey, this patient is doing just fine. So you actually don’t need to reach out to them, but this other person has an issue that requires your attention. So this is how we can increase the quality of care for really every patient, at the same time increasing the efficiency for pharmacists.

[0:14:18] CS: Sure, meeting the patient where they’re at, and then directing the support where it’s needed the most. When did you have this idea, and when did you transition full-time into working with Pharmesol? What did the development look like of the company for you?

[0:14:33] NP: I don’t know. I think I had a lot of different thoughts. I don’t really think there was like one point I was like, “Oh, this is the idea.” Even as I said, I just had different thoughts in the back of my mind. Kind of, “Oh, yes. I think this could be better. Why is it like this? Is this all we can do?” But that doesn’t mean I really thought like, “Oh, I should start up company.” It was like a really – it’s a pretty common moment for a lot of people where you feel like, “Oh, this really sucks.” 

Then, I think it kind of accumulates, compounds, and actually, even what I thought might be kind of a viable business idea in the beginning was not exactly what we’re doing today. But I think what really helped solidify what we’re currently working on was really the feedback of other people, like other pharmacists, other doctors, other nurses, administration, the administrators at health plans, health systems, pharmacy benefit managers, pharmacies. Our team reached out to these folks and ask them, “Hey, what do you think is kind of like an opportunity area? What are problematic and challenging for you guys?” Because I understand – I don’t know, I guess, like, I’m just one person, like one health system just because I think this is a problem, and this is a good idea. That doesn’t necessarily mean other people see the value. So I think it was just through organic interactions. Some organic, some were actually – we reached out to them to learn these insights. I think through that is how we got to where we are today.

[0:16:36] CS: Sounds like a good organic amount of some kind of market analysis and trying to figure out a product market fit for where this kind of technology can really provide the most value. Did you go through some kind of accelerator program or a business development program? Or how did you really hone in on trying to figure out where you are today, and ultimately, what is this end product going to look like? What kind of steps did you take to get to this point?

[0:17:07] NP: Yes. We actually pretty recently completed an accelerator program, a startup accelerator program. It’s called Entrepreneurs Roundtable Accelerator NYC, ERA NYC. My team, I have two co-founders. We’re first-time founders. Starting a company, founding a company, isn’t something we’re used to. There’s a lot of questions, and problems that you’re faced with that you never really had to think about in a corporate setting. I think going through this accelerator program was really helpful from that perspective because there are a lot of mentors, who are previous startup founders, current startup founders, or operators who’ve sort of like really thought about innovation, and developing a new product bringing into market. We definitely learned a lot from being part of this accelerator program.

[0:18:13] CS: Certainly, the aspect of you don’t know what you don’t know, and we’re trained with such a small clinical skill set, especially when you decide to pursue a specialty. I mean, there’s so many aspects of business, and I feel like that’s where a lot of YFP listeners want to start something new or have a new idea. It’s not the pharmacy component that’s the most intimidating. It’s the finances, and the business acumen, and getting funding, or getting your foot in the door with the market. That becomes so overwhelming, much faster than the pharmacy component does in most cases. I can see how an accelerator program is absolutely a great way to make you a well-rounded competitor in a space where you just don’t know what you don’t know, for the most part. So Natalie, you mentioned you have two co-founders. How did you meet these people? Where did you cross paths? Then, what skills do they bring to the company that are different than your own?

[0:19:11] NP: Yes. I’m really lucky to have two software engineers as my co-founders. Saumya is one of my co-founders, software engineer by training. She studied computer science at MIT for her bachelors and she was doing Master of Engineering when I met her. She has a lot of experience applying AI in healthcare in particular. She’s always had a lot of interest in healthcare, so that’s really helpful. Batman is our CTO, also software engineer by training. He had worked at multiple startups, building from scratch. Then he also recently graduated from MIT from Masters of Systems Design and management program. 

I didn’t even necessarily work in a – not even necessary. My work experiences in pharma and health system, I think are really crucial to what we’re doing at Pharmesol. I actually don’t think I could have started Pharmesol if I didn’t work at those healthcare companies, and learned what does the dynamics look like, what do each healthcare stakeholder kind of looked for? But again, the different – in some sense, actually, developing a product I don’t think is that different. I actually think every person in any role is probably developing some kind of product and like looking for a product market fit. But not – I wasn’t in kind of a traditional tech environment. I actually wasn’t even familiar with concepts of like Sprint, how do we use a Jira to do like task of tracking project management.

They definitely bring a lot of expertise from technical and product development perspective. I actually think our team is definitely –one of the strengths of our team, kind of our unique is composition of skill sets and backgrounds, I think is one of the strengths for Pharmesol.

[0:21:43] CS: Definitely. I mean, it sounds like you have an all-star lineup of people that specialize in areas that you don’t. So you become a well-rounded team pretty quickly, which is really important to success in the long run, I think. That’s really so great. I want to highlight something that you said, Natalie, which I think is really important, and maybe will resonate with a lot of listeners. Is that, everyone is problem solving in their job in some way, shape, or form. Whether you realize it or not, you’re probably doing something where you realize that this doesn’t work, or this isn’t ideal, and you’ve either created a shortcut yourself, or maybe you don’t even realize it, but everyone is problem solving on the job. It’s just a matter of maybe being in tune to that, and starting to expand your thinking with, how can I find a solution that works for a larger amount of people, or that can be applied on a larger scale. I thought that was just really beautiful to tap into.

Something else that I would love to ask you is, what stage of your life were you in when you were developing this company? So something that we hear about a lot is that I have this great idea, but I have student loans, or I can’t leave my job, I have X, Y, and Z that are going to be prioritized before I prioritize my own career. Where were you in your personal and professional life when you were developing Pharmesol? If you just don’t mind sharing a little bit of that, I think that’ll be inspirational to the listeners too.

[0:23:09] NP: I was never earning all that much. Let’s just start there. I didn’t have much to lose if that makes sense. From kind of typical, like financial perspective, right? It’s because I was – I would say, I was still fairly early in my career. It’s not like I had developed 20 years of my career, and I’m already in some advanced leadership role at an organization with great comp package, with stock options that just aren’t worth so much. It’s hard for me to walk away from that. That’s not where I was at in my career. I do think, honestly, that helped me in kind of taking a leap of faith. Another thing is, I guess, because that’s where I was at my career, I think my lifestyle was in a certain way, it was very modest again. So I didn’t have to make a lot of lifestyle adjustments if I were to be in a state where I really needed to preserve my runway to be able to focus on kind of this venture.

So you can think of that as a negative thing. But then, it I guess kind of worked out for me. I also say that because I have seen a lot of people around me who are kind of like golden caught essentially. They have really well-paying, high-paying jobs, and that makes them hard to leave. I don’t really think it’s a bad thing to pursue financial security, I think it’s a great thing. So it’s probably – I guess, if you have a question about, it doesn’t make sense for me to leave this financial security to pursue this venture. That might be a sign that maybe it’s not worth it. The fact that you’re kind of wondering about that.

I guess one thing I do want to mention is, starting a company is really difficult. It has been very difficult. Not to say not pursue it. I do think it is a decision that takes a lot of consideration, and ask yourself honestly like, “Why do I want to do this? Is this worth it?” I think there are a lot of low-risk ways to try to validate the problem, idea, the product, and then de-risk it for yourself, and then jump into it. So then you’re more comfortable, and you’re really able to focus on it, rather than worrying about financial security.

[0:26:17] CS: I think that was really well put. So there’s certainly an element of sinking or swimming in starting a new business venture and going full in to see if it works. But unfortunately, that’s not conducive to necessarily financial security or stability. That’s something that we really want to highlight on this podcast too, is that it’s amazing to step into these nontraditional roles, and there’s so much opportunity, but there’s so much variability in how that can be done. A lot of it also comes down to the risk tolerance of the person who’s going to end up making that jump. Where does your risk tolerance lie? Are you really risk averse? Are you going to need to try a bunch of things while you’re still in your financially secure position? Or are you going to be better off taking a huge leap of faith and you’ve got a high-risk tolerance, and you can figure these things out as you’re kind of flailing along?

Everyone is really different, and I think that was really beautifully put about. There’s ways that you can make this a lower-risk jump, while still staying in your current position. Because starting a new company is extremely difficult, like we talked about – there’s so many things you don’t know that you don’t even know until you’re forced to face them with aspects of the business and finances. I just think that was really well said, and thank you for that insight.

[0:27:39] NP: Yes, of course. Just one thing I want to add is, I think one thing I realized over, and over, and over again is, nobody has the answer for you. Literally, nobody knows. I think one of the things, particularly as a first-time founder, I seek out a lot of advice, and there are so many conflicting advice, yet everything is valid. I say that to say, I think some people will probably in this topic in particular like, “Oh, you should take the risk when you’re younger because like it makes sense. You just have less obligations.” Others might say, “Oh, it’s better till you have financial security. You have some kind of leeway to make investments, and then still – if it doesn’t work out, you still have kind of a lot of savings that you can leverage.

But I mean, none of these are really like answers. It’s like, I think only you can figure out what is right for you. So I think just having a lot of honest conversations with yourself is probably the only thing.

[0:28:55] CS: Well, hey, you know what, that answer is very valid, along with the million other answers that you can get from a bunch of different people. I kind of want to shift this conversation a little bit into the evolution of the profession alongside technology. I feel like you’re in a great position to maybe speak to what you think pharmacy will look like in the coming decades. So, I have – it’s a totally loaded question, and there is no right or wrong answer. I can see your face on the screen right now.

But I have a lot of very progressive thinkers and pharmacy entrepreneurs in my orbit, and that’s just a constant conversation piece. What is pharmacy going to look like when a lot of traditional dispensing roles can be outplaced and outpaced with technology? So you’re in a position where you worked a lot with computer information and artificial intelligence and you’ve got a company that’s really relying on those things. What do you think pharmacy is going to look like in the next couple of years, and just any advice for pharmacists that are maybe a little hesitant to address the technology evolution that’s upon us?

[0:30:12] NP: I personally think pharmacy is a huge opportunity area, or just healthcare industry overall. That’s because I think it’s a lever that hasn’t been pulled as much, leveraged as much. Because when I share what I’m doing with Pharmesol, a lot of people actually – their reaction is, “Wait, that like makes so much sense. Why is this not happening today? How come nobody’s asking me if I’m doing okay or how I’m doing?” It’s so obvious when you paint a picture of how it could be, but that’s not the case for a lot of people. That’s why I say, I think there is so much untapped potential and opportunity here for our society, but also for healthcare organizations. That’s partly because I’m bullish on healthcare moving towards value-based care.

I mean, you see these value-based care organizations that are being very profitable because they’re taking on the risk, but they’re also realizing those rewards, which is why I think we will just progressively increasingly move towards value-based care, and what levers do we have to really improve health outcomes. 

I mean, there could be multiple, but I think pharmacy is an obvious one, and leveraging more pharmacists to provide this care. This is also a framework for our success as well because, as mentioned, we are able to really supercharge the clinical team, to be able to more efficiently, and effectively improve patient experience, and then patient outcomes. That’s what I think about the future of pharmacy.

[0:32:21] CS: I love that. I love supercharging the clinical team. I don’t think I’ve heard that phrase before. But I love the evolution of really moving towards value-based care. I completely agree with you. I think that that just has to be the direction that we need to move in order to provide outcomes that can be financially sustainable, but also just supercharging the clinical team with using a pharmacist. It’s so hard on a national level to even measure this because every state uses pharmacists so differently, which is certainly a barrier. But really loving the idea of the profession is underutilized overall. And being able to finally leverage us to practice towards the top of our license in positions like this, and in roles like this, I think will just be a complete game changer for the profession. I love your mindset and I love that you’re bullish on the value-based care model.

Natalie, I’ll kind of wrap things up. I’ve got three questions just to kind of roll off the tongue and provide a little bit of a well-rounded oversight with you being an entrepreneur in a non-traditional pharmacy space. But what is the most memorable thing or event that has happened to you since being a pharmacy entrepreneur?

[0:33:38] NP: Wait, this question is actually really hard. Let me –

[0:33:43] CS: Yes, take your time. It’s all good.

[0:33:43] NP: Most memorable? Okay, I think a couple of things come to mind. I think the first one is when we first put up our product. So we use text messages, and then when I got the first text message from our system, that was pretty exciting. The other thing was, once we started working with patients, patients sent us this response with thank you with the heart emoji. For some reason, I didn’t expect patients to be using emojis. We work with a primary care clinic and it’s a lot of like elderly patients, right? I mean, they text us, but for some reason, I didn’t expect them to send us an emoji. So like, I remember seeing that and just being really happy about that.

[0:34:39] CS: Something so simple and so common, just seeing it put it all together.

[0:34:45] NP: It was very inspiring. I was like, “It was all worth it.”

[0:34:49] CS: No, that’s very cute. That’s so meaningful too, especially coming from the patients. That’s when you know it’s reached your end user, it’s finally making a difference, certainly emotional. What is your favorite part in general about being an entrepreneur and taking ownership of your career path?

[0:35:06] NP: I think this also is in two parts. One is that, I love learning. I think that sort of has been like the North Star in my career, in every role I had. That’s like what I wanted to do, just understand more, learn more. I think entrepreneurship is a great place to do that because so many things I don’t know.

[0:35:30] CS: Endless.

[0:35:31] NP: And so many problems to solve. I think the other is the autonomy. Like, “Okay, here’s this problem, and I’m going to solve this problem today” or “I’m going to do something about it.” That feels really, really empowering.

[0:35:50] CS: I love both of those. You’re right, being your own boss, it’s great to have the autonomy to do what you want. But there are always problems to solve, and you will always be learning. A great combination of two things for you to be successful as an entrepreneur. Last question I have for you is, one piece of advice for anyone that’s contemplating a non-traditional career path.

[0:36:14] NP: One advice. I would say, I would tell them to do something about it. I think that’s maybe one thing that I might be better at than sort of like average people, like execution. It’s not that I’m like doing something well, but I’m doing something. I think that has sort of eventually kind of led me to this path. This can include things like reaching out to people that you want to connect with, and learn, and hear about their story. Or listening to this podcast, I think would be a great example of doing something about it. But I think those are the actions you take, I think eventually become your experiences, and then insights to making decisions in the end. 

[0:37:08] CS: That’s great, great response. Natalie, if the viewers want to reach you and want to take some more action, where is the best place that they can learn more about Pharmesol or connect with you?

[0:37:21] NP: Yes, so I’m pretty active on LinkedIn, so they can find me on LinkedIn. Or my email is [email protected], so they can reach me through my email as well.

[0:37:35] CS: Perfect. We’ll link both of those things in the show notes. We’ll also link the direct website to Natalie’s company, Pharmesol if you want to really see what the product looks like, and learn more about the company. But Natalie, thank you for being here today. We love having pharmacists that are really pushing the profession forward. I think that’s exactly what you’re doing, and it’s beautiful to see, really the pharmacy profession evolve in a meaningful way alongside technology. It was so insightful to hear your responses, and your viewpoint, being a working, living example of someone who’s going to be really successful in that space. Thanks for being here today.

[0:38:16] NP: Thank you so much. I’m super excited to be working with pharmacists, and empower them, and inspired by them as well. Thank you so much for having me. 

[0:38:27] CS: Perfect, thanks.

[END OF INTERVIEW]

[SPONSOR MESSAGE]

[0:38:30] JW: Hey, this is Justin again from the YFP team. Thanks for tuning in to today’s podcast. If you’re a pharmacy professional, you know how crucial it is to have access to reliable drug information. That’s why we’re excited to tell you about Pyrls, today’s podcast sponsor. Gone are the days spending hundreds of dollars for access to drug information. Pyrls offers top drug summaries, clinical teaching points, a drug interaction checker, calculators, and guideline reviews all in a user-friendly resource. Whether you prefer accessing information to your web browser, a Chrome extension, or mobile app, Pyrls has got you covered. Plus, for a limited time, you can visit pyrls.com to get access to more than 25 free pharmacotherapy charts to get you started. Upgrade your drug information resource today with Pyrls. Visit pyrls.com. That’s P-Y-R-L-S .com to learn more. Thanks again for listening.

[OUTRO]

[0:39:23] TU: As we conclude this week’s podcast, an important reminder that the content on this show is provided to you for informational purposes only and is not intended to provide, and should not be relied on for investment or any other advice. Information in the podcast and corresponding materials should not be construed as a solicitation or offer to buy or sell any investment or related financial products. We urge listeners to consult with a financial advisor with respect to any investment. 

Furthermore, the information contained in our archive, newsletters, blog post, and podcast is not updated and may not be accurate at the time you listen to it on the podcast. Opinions and analyses expressed herein are solely those of your financial pharmacist unless otherwise noted, and constitute judgments as of the dates publish. Such information may contain forward-looking statements, which are not intended to be guarantees of future events. Actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements.

For more information, please visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/disclaimer. Thank you again for your support of the Your Financial Pharmacist podcast. Have a great rest of your week.

[END]

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YFP 326: #PharmGradWishlist: Supporting Racially & Ethnically Minoritized Pharmacist Trainees


Drs. Lindsey Childs-Kean and Britny Brown share their work with #PharmGradWishlist to support emerging racially and ethnically minoritized pharmacy trainees.

Episode Summary

It is no secret that there are minorities underrepresented in pharmacy despite the evidence suggesting that racial concordance matters. Joining us today are two individuals, Lindsey Childs-Kean and Britny Brown, who are committed to improving representation by supporting emerging racially and ethnically minoritized pharmacy trainees. You’ll hear about the incredible PharmGradWishlist organization, what its mission is, why it’s important, and how to get involved.

About Today’s Guest

  • Lindsey Childs-Kean is a Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Pharmacotherapy and Translational Research with the University of Florida College of Pharmacy. She earned her PharmD degree from University of Florida and completed a PGY1 residency at Tampa General Hospital and a PGY2 Infectious Diseases residency at the South Texas Veterans Healthcare System.  Her teaching, research, and practice interests include infectious disease pharmacotherapy and professional development of students and new practitioners. She is active in many professional organizations, including being a member of the PharmGradWishList Leadership Team and an Associate Editor for the American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education.

  • Britny Brown, PharmD, BCOP is a Clinical Associate Professor at the University of Rhode Island. Her clinical practice site is Smilow Cancer Center in Westerly, RI, where she focuses on the management of patients receiving oral anticancer therapy. Britny also has a passion for health equity. She is co-chair of the Diversity and Globalization Committee within URI’s College of Pharmacy, is a leadership team member for PharmGradWishlist, and is a member of the HOPA DEI Advisory Group.

Key Points From the Episode

  • Welcoming Lindsey Childs-Kean and Britny Brown and why they were drawn to this field.
  • All about PharmGradWishlist and what the goal is. 
  • How PharmGradWishlist got started and what inspired our guests to get involved. 
  • Why underrepresentation matters in this profession and healthcare at large. 
  • The differences between internal and external support for minorities in the pharmacy field. 
  • Financial issues minorities, in particular, face as they transition to pharmaceutical residency. 
  • How listeners can learn more about PharmGradWishlist and get involved in their mission. 
  • What’s in the cards for the future of PharmGradWishlist.

Episode Highlights

[PharmGrad Wishlist’s] mission is to promote equity by sponsoring racially and ethnically minoritized pharmacists and pharmacists’ trainees as they progress through the profession.” — @HemeOncPharm [0:03:32]

“Racial concordance does correlate to improved health outcomes, increased patient satisfaction, decreased emergency room utilization, and decreased health care utilization.” @HemeOncPharm [0:13:25]

What we’re focused on doing with PharmGradWishlist is supporting those individuals who are in pharmacy school and in the pharmacy profession, as they move through the profession.” — @corevalues5 [0:16:28]

“We’ve told you about what we’ve done [in] the last two years and we really think we’re just getting started [with PharmGradWishlist]”@corevalues5 [0:24:55]

Links Mentioned in Today’s Episode

Episode Transcript

[INTRODUCTION]

[0:00:01] TU: Hey, everybody. Tim Ulbrich here. Thank you for listening to the YFP Podcast, where each week we strive to inspire and encourage you on your path towards achieving financial freedom. This week, I welcome Lindsey Childs-Kean, and Britny Brown to the show to talk about PharmGradWishlist and the vision they have to support racially and ethnically minoritized pharmacy trainees. We discuss the inspiration for PharmGradWishlist, the impact that it’s having, and how others can get involved. 

Before we jump into my conversation with Lindsey and Britny, let’s hear a brief message from YFP team member Justin Woods. 

[YFP MESSAGE]

[0:00:33] JW: Hey, Your Financial Pharmacists community. This is Justin Woods here, Director of Business Development at YFP. You may be one of the 13,000 pharmacists that have already signed up for YFP Money Matters, which is our weekly newsletter, but if you’re not, what are you waiting for? I want to invite you to subscribe. We send financial tips, recommendations, the latest podcast episode, and money resources, all specifically for pharmacists. It all comes straight to your inbox every Friday morning, so visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/newsletter, or click the link in the show notes to subscribe today. Again, that’s yourfinancialpharmacist.com/newsletter. See you there. 

[INTERVIEW]

[0:01:19] TU: Lindsey and Britny, welcome to the show. 

[0:01:21] LCK: Thanks for having us, Tim. 

[0:01:22] BB: Thank you so much. We’re very excited to be here.

[0:01:24] TU: Lindsey, let’s have you kick us off by introducing yourself to our listeners, including what drew you into the profession and the work that you’re doing now. 

[0:01:35] LCK: I’m Lindsey Childs-Kean. I’m a clinical associate professor at the University of Florida College of Pharmacy. My clinical area of specialty is infectious diseases, but I do most of my time as a faculty member teaching and mentoring pharmacy students. I could talk a long time about how I got into pharmacy school because I took a very weird trajectory to pharmacy school. Basically, I ended up making the decision that in looking at the healthcare system, there was so much that pharmacists could do that I wanted to be a part of that. So, that’s why I went to pharmacy school. Then I also have a master’s of public health degree and my specialty was global infectious diseases. That’s how I got into the infectious disease area and did two years of residency, including an infectious disease residency after pharmacy school. 

[0:02:25] TU: Great. Britny, how about for you? 

[0:02:27] BB: Yeah. Thanks for having us. I’m a clinical associate professor, as well, at the University of Rhode Island. My area of focus is oncology. I would say my trajectory into where I am now started with just being interested in pharmacy, learning more about medications, and how we can improve health outcomes. Getting into cancer care, I was initially really intimidated, because it’s a different language, but seeing the impact that we can have is what drove me towards specifically working with that patient population. 

[0:02:59] TU: Great. Well, we are excited to have both of you. While you had great pharmacy careers, that’s not what we’re here to talk about today. We’re going to be focusing rather on the work that you and others are doing in leading through the PharmGradWishlist. Britny, let’s start with you. Tell us more about PharmGradWishlist. What’s the mission? How did it get started? What’s the goal? What are you trying to achieve? 

[0:03:21] BB: Absolutely. PharmGradWishlist is a mutual aid organization of 10 practicing pharmacists across the country that make up our leadership team. Our mission is to promote equity by sponsoring racially and ethnically minoritized pharmacists and pharmacists’ trainees as they progress through the profession. We did model this after a similar movement in the medical community called MedGradWishlist. It’s evolved to more than just wish lists. That part stems from individuals, trainees usually, making Amazon wish lists and what they need to enter into their pharmacy profession. 

It might be a variety of different things, office supplies to help them get started, study materials, and sponsors nationally can work through and identify individuals they’d like to sponsor as they enter their career. In addition, we’ve also created a scholarship program for the last two years now going into our third year for individuals that are seeking postgraduate training. We have some stats with that. 

Our first year, we sponsored $2,500 scholarships. In our second year, which was 2022 through this spring, we sponsored 39 scholarships. That encompassed actually just 85 unique donors. The large vast majority of donors actually contributed a significant amount to our sponsees. We really hope to continue that momentum and bring our movement to other people’s attention. I’ll let Lindsey talk a little bit more about what else we’ve done with our movement as well. 

[0:05:03] LCK: Yeah. Also, to note, in addition to that number of scholarships that we’ve done over two years, we also have had well over a hundred wish lists each year that have been available for sponsors to choose to support our sponsees. Outside of the wish lists and scholarships, those are obviously our two really big initiatives that we do each year. We’ve also been able to work with a number of racially and ethnically minoritized trainees in publishing, commentaries, and other types of articles. 

We have at least five published papers to date, depending upon when this goes live. If something else might be published by then, and we’ve got some others in the works. So, we encourage the listeners to go read those publications. We also – because we are recruiting sponsors and sponsees, we put a big focus on communications. We have a website. We also have a blog, where we will write about different issues that are related to racial and ethnic concerns. 

We’re also active on multiple social media platforms. So basically, if there’s a social media platform, we’re probably there. One other thing that we have looked or to expand out is partnering with other pharmacy organizations, both national and state level and regional organizations. These take different flavors of what we do to help support their trainees in that particular area or within their mission and scope. 

[0:06:37] TU: If I heard the two of you correctly, really three major areas, scholarships, wish lists, and now on the publication dissemination of information with an expansion going out to organizations and opportunities for them to get involved as well. Really incredible work. First of all, congratulations. I mean, to see the grassroots efforts of that. I mean, 20 to 39 scholarships. I mean, that’s a big impact. There are over 300,000 pharmacists in the country, right? Britny, I think you mentioned somewhere in the 75, 80-ish donors that went –

[0:07:11] BB: Yeah. 85 donors this year Yeah.

[0:07:13] TU: 85. What an awesome opportunity. We’ll talk about that at the end of the show, as well. For folks that want to get involved. Let’s do it, right? Great work that’s being done, but also great opportunities that are still to be had as you look to grow the impact that your work is doing. Lindsey, my question here is why get involved with PharmGradWishlist, right? There’s lots of different opportunities to give back, to be involved. Certainly, this is an investment of your time, as well as the others that are on the leadership team. What really is the motivation for you to get involved? 

[0:07:46] LCK: Some of our backstory is that pharm, the leadership team really formed over the social media platform that used to be called Twitter. One of our leadership team members said, “Hey, there’s this MedGradWishlist thing going on. Why don’t we do it in pharmacy?” It was an informal call for others to get involved. The more I looked into it, I really gravitated towards the very tangible method of support. It’s one thing to donate money or time to a big national organization, but you don’t always know where that money and time and effort are going to. Whereas with this, I know very specifically. 

If I buy a set of scrubs for a trainee who’s going to be starting residency in a couple of months, that’s very tangible or if I donate money towards a scholarship, I see that money going directly to that recipient. It’s a very tangible way to support our efforts to diversify and make our profession more equitable. That’s what drew me to PharmGradWishlist. 

[0:09:01] TU: Yeah. I really like what you said there. I recently had on the podcast, Tom Dauber, who has a career in advancement and giving, working with institutions, most notably colleges of pharmacy. One of the questions I asked him is what are donors often looking for, right? Is there making a selection or a choice of a gift? He talked exactly about what you said impact, right? Being able to see or feel directly, not only that there’s an alignment there of something that they care about, but that they also can be able to see that change or see the impact that that gift is happening. Britny, what about for you? What was the motivation, the inspiration for your involvement? 

[0:09:39] BB: Similar to Lindsey, I was just felt very lucky that our colleague Betsy had reached out to us, identifying that we’re all like-minded individuals that wanted to see change in terms of representation in our profession. I think probably similar to many of our listeners, not many of us knew where to start, right? There was an infrastructure that existed to help make that change. I think that’s what PharmGradWishlist provides, right? That tangible impact that Lindsey was talking about, but also giving you the infrastructure. 

Hopefully, it makes our supporters easily able to access that, right? To see change tangibly in a short period of time, but also to not have to do much work to get there. You just click a link, provide your money or decide what you want to give to someone on their wish list. It’s really as easy as five minutes of your time. 

[0:10:36] TU: You guys have done a great job with the website. I think it very succinctly talks about what you’re doing, why you’re doing it. For those that are eager to go look at that, we’ll mention at the end as well, link to it in the show notes. It’s pharmgradwishlist.org. Again, it’s pharmgradwishlist.org. I want to talk a little bit, and Britny, I’m going to start with you and Lindsey, feel free to jump in as well. 

There was a commentary that the two of you, as well as a group of others, were involved with, published in JAPhA in 2022, we’ll link to it in the show notes. The title was Brighter Horizons: The Necessity of Concentrated Sponsorship Targeted Toward Minoritized Student Pharmacists. Talking a lot about the why and the how of what you’ve been building at at PharmGradWishlist. Britny, perhaps an obvious question, but one that I feel needs to be asked is, why does this mission matter? Why does under-representation matter in our profession and health care at large? 

Let me read one passage from the commentary and then get your take on it. That passage is, “Since the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy began reporting data on races and ethnicities of student pharmacists in 1985, students who identify as Black, Hispanic, or Latinx, American Indian, or Alaska Native have enrolled and graduated at disproportionately lower rates compared with their demographic makeup and the US population.” Why does that matter? 

[0:12:00] BB: That’s a great question. I’m so glad that you’re asking it. I think we hear a lot of representation matters, right, regardless of whether we’re talking about pharmacy, medicine, politics, seeing oneself in their profession helps others to envision that they could potentially one day be there. We’re pharmacists. We like data. There is data that exists in the healthcare realm that having representation improves health outcomes. 

Much of this data stems from medicine, doctors that have decreased morbidity and mortality when they have racially concordant providers. That’s there. We know that it decreases mortality with physicians. Unfortunately, that data hasn’t been found yet in pharmacy specifically, however, there has been data that looks at how we improve adherence just by being racially concordant. One could potentially extrapolate that to say, if you’re more adherent to your diabetes medications, you’re more likely to gain control of your diabetes, likewise with hypertension and cancer. 

I think that it’s just an opportunity for us to do more research in this area. It’s something that we’re certainly advocating for our pharmacy colleagues to pursue, but we do know that overall, within medicine, that racial concordance does correlate to improved health outcomes, increased patient satisfaction, decreased emergency room utilization, and decreased health care utilization for sick visits and things like that. There’s certainly a precedent that we could set with our research if we have the resources to pursue it. 

[0:13:49] TU: Which goes back, I think, so well to the mission, right? You’ve got some tangible opportunities for people to get involved in needs that are there right now. Then when you talk about the research, the publication, the efforts as more individuals, as more organizations get involved in this, obviously those resources can be really important to allow that research work to be happening and hopefully to add to the literature, you know, what’s currently is missing in the pharmacy profession. 

Let me continue to put you on the hot seat while I have you there, Britny. In the commentary, it also mentions, “Dismantling structural racism within pharmacy programs requires evaluation of internal and external factors and creation of novel methods to support these students in a holistic manner.” What are a couple key points as it relates to internal versus external and the difference between those? 

[0:14:37] BB: Yeah. That’s a great question too. I like to think of internal as within our own pharmacy programs. Whatever structure we have in place, which might include policies, procedures, our institutional status quo, what have we been doing for the last 100 years that might be inherently racist and how do we examine that through an equity lens to see how we might better support our students, right? What microaggressions are occurring in the classroom between professors and students, students to students that we can improve upon to make students feel like they are empowered to succeed in school and then their profession. How do we retain our diverse learners? 

Then externally, I would think of that more as how do we bring diverse people into our profession. Externally, as you said, we don’t have good racial representation. How do we, in a world that is inherently racist, engage people who hadn’t traditionally seen themselves in our profession or maybe don’t have the same opportunities to accessing postgraduate training as an example? I think those are – that’s the lens that I view it in. I think there’s a lot of different nuances to it that we probably can’t – don’t have the time to get into today, but maybe just some surface-level viewpoints. 

[0:16:03] LCK: Yeah. I think one of the things to take away from this is one initiative is not going to solve all these problems. PharmGradWishlist has a very specific mission that we’ve already laid out. We’re not going to do anything about those upstream factors that are preventing diverse groups of people that are getting into pharmacy school, but what we’re focused on doing with PharmGradWishlist is supporting those individuals who are in pharmacy school and in the pharmacy profession, as they move through the profession. We at this point aren’t able to tackle every problem out there, no initiative is. We had to pick something to focus on. This is, as we’ve said, a very tangible way to support the individuals so that hopefully, they are able to bridge the issues and structural racism that they’ve had to face to get to the point that they’re even at. 

[0:17:05] TU: Yeah. Speaking of very specific ways to get involved, Lindsey. One of the things that that commentary I think does a nice job of calling out is when we think about residency as just one example, of other efforts that you have ongoing. One thing is that even in talking about this every week some of the connections that may not be so obvious is, hey, traditional financial aid, right, which can lead to student indebtedness and other challenges, but there’s access to resource there does not extend to those additional costs, right? 

When we think about what we often see as somebody who goes through their P4 year, they transition into residency or in a fellowship, it is a very difficult financial time, right? Especially if they’re applying out of state, application costs, licensure, moving, new things that come with any type of transition like that. Just talk more about why that transition is so important and why PharmGradWishlist is wanting to really have an impact. For that group where, again, financially, it may not play a role in being able to support those students. 

[0:18:10] LCK: You’re absolutely right, Tim. Students get a set amount, a set maximum amount of money every year. That doesn’t matter if you are all of a sudden in your last year of pharmacy school and want to pursue postgraduate training and in all likelihood, that’s going to entail some professional clothing to do an interview, likely travel to do interviews, although more and more programs are doing virtual interviews, which that does sometimes help level the playing field a little bit. Those things just to get to the interview point.

In addition to the fees for applications through forecasts and all of that. Then once you get to, as you mentioned, the transition financial aid ends after that last semester. There’s licensing fees. There are moving fees. Lots of different things that happen. A lot of our students, once they start their first job, they are also in the process of setting up some kind of living arrangement, an apartment or house or something like that. These wish lists are meant for them to put whatever it is that they need for that. 

Again, I bought everything from reference textbooks, to kitchen utensils, to scrubs, to really nice-looking pillows so that they can sleep well off of these wish lists. Not having some financial backing of parents or other individuals is very common in our students and trainees who come from racially and ethnically minoritized groups. They don’t have that extra cushion, like I did in pharmacy school where I was like, “Hey, dad, I need an extra $500.” For whatever it was when I was transitioning to residency. A lot of them don’t have that. That’s where the wish lists and the scholarships come into play, where that is again, tangible money or items that they need in those times where money is probably even more tight than it is to begin with. 

[0:20:28] TU: Yeah. I think the further, well said, the further we get from graduation or some of us were in these shoes. I think the harder it is for us to remember the feeling that that was, right? I often talk with students and those transitioning that just have this overwhelming feeling as if they’re drowning financially, right? They’ve got these things that they want to pursue, but there’s just so many transition things that are happening. Obviously, student loans are coming back online. They’re making moves, as you mentioned. 

We actually have an article on our site. I was just pulling up as we were talking here that Brandon Dyson from TLDR wrote a few years ago on the cost of the pharmacy residency quest, and he broke it down into three phases, the application, the mid-year trip, and then the interview. That doesn’t even account for any of the costs with the transition, right? Once you actually start that residency. When you start to add these things up, like in the application, you’ve got registration for the match, registration for payment for the forecast applications, potentially transcripts that you have to acquire. 

Then you have the mid-year trip if you’re pursuing that and all of the travel and costs that come with that. Then obviously the travel and costs that come with the interview as well. You start to stack some of this up and it adds up. That typically is a year where financially, because experiential rotations are often a significant financial burden for students. This is something even on top of that as well that causes some stress. Such a necessary, I think effort to help those students in the transition. 

Britny with that in mind is people are listening to this and say, “Hey, I want to help. I want to support. I want to get involved.” Whether that’s with the scholarships, whether that’s with the GradWishlist, whether that’s just staying up to date with what you guys are doing, some of the research that you’re doing. What’s the best place that people can go to learn more and as well to get involved with support? 

[0:22:21] BB: Absolutely. Our website that you mentioned pharmgradwishlist.org is a great place to start. You can actually sign up for our email list at the bottom of the website. If you scroll all the way down, enter in your email, any page on that website to stay up to date on what’s going on. We will send out communication with scholarships and wish list go live. In addition, we have social media platforms on Twitter or X as it’s now called, as well as Instagram on both our handle is pharmgradwish. Then on LinkedIn, we are PharmGradWishlist. You can find us on Facebook as well. 

[0:23:02] TU: Awesome. What about individuals? I think many people listening are probably interested in getting involved as an individual, but if someone is a leader within an organization, whether it’s an association, as was mentioned previously, whether it’s a for-profit company and they want to get involved with making a donation. Are there opportunities for organizations, companies to get involved as well? 

[0:23:25] BB: Absolutely. I think probably the best way if you’re interested in having a higher level of support would be to email us at [email protected] or you could contact us through our website. Either of those should be good ways to get started. That being said, if you are an institution, we have had individuals rally their departments and their colleagues to support scholarships. We’ve had a few instances where they supported multiple scholarships, which was amazing. 

Then of course, just helping to get the word out is extremely impactful. As we mentioned earlier with our scholarships, we had 85 sponsors. Imagine if we could reach even 1,000, which is still just a fraction of practicing pharmacists in the United States. So, help us get the word out, share through your institutional newsletters and email lists serves when the time comes that our scholarships are live and wish lists are live. 

[0:24:27] TU: Awesome. We’ll link to that email address as well. You mentioned [email protected] for those that want to reach out with questions or I know we have business owners listening. I know we have organization leaders listening that can either, potentially, get involved from a donation in that standpoint, individually or getting their constituents and members involved as well. Lindsey, what does the future hold? What are some of the future directions for ParmGradWishlist? 

[0:24:53] LCK: Yeah. We’re excited. We’ve told you about what we’ve done the last two years and we really think we’re just getting started. We’re looking into additional partnerships with national pharmacy organizations to expand our reach to both trainees that could be sponsees, as well as sponsors to help support our sponsees. We are looking into pursuing nonprofit status. Up until now, it’s been just us doing the work, but we’re looking to potentially be more formal as a nonprofit organization. Which we do hope that if we pursue that and then eventually get a 501(c)(3) designation. We hope that will also drive interest in supporting our initiative. 

Then as we expand, we have also talked about maybe setting up a committee structure, where we might be able to bring additional people on board to do some of the work of the initiative. Again, the website and being signed up for the email listserv are the best places to keep up to date on how all of those things, progress. Highly recommend going to the website pharmgradwishlist.org and signing up for the email alerts. I promise we don’t send very many. It’s only when we have big things that are happening. 

[0:26:15] TU: Awesome. Well, that will be the challenge to our community. Make sure you’re informed with the work that is being done at PharmGradWishlist. You’ve got the website pharmgradwishlist.org, you can sign up for the newsletter if you’re ready to make a donation and get involved. You can do that as well. Let me wrap up our time by reading a couple of the words of support that you have from sponsees on your website that I think encapsulates so well the impact that you all are having and the work that is being done. 

The first one is from a 2021 grad who said, “I wanted to reach out and thank you all for the amazing work you’re doing with the PharmGradWishlist. You’ve taken the time out of your busy schedules to do this wonderful act of kindness for your future colleagues and it hasn’t gone unnoticed. As a graduating student, I am awe-inspired by the amount of care and effort you have put into this initiative. Thank you for all your hard work. You are changing lives.” 

From another recent grad, “My goals after graduation are to care for the underserved population and bridge health disparities through direct patient care as a community pharmacist in my home state. Going forward, I hope to become a mentor to other first-generation, Asian-Americans with goals of becoming a pharmacist as I know how difficult it can be when it comes to preparing and applying for a competitive program with little guidance. With graduation just around the corner, I am extremely grateful to PharmGradWishlist and the entire family for helping me transition from a student pharmacist to a pharmacist.” 

Amazing words there. I think just so well, really again encapsulate the work that you all are doing. The impact that it has and for those that are looking to get involved to make a donation, the impact that that donation is going to have. Britny and Lindsey, thank you so much for taking time to come on the show to share the journey and I look forward to following the success ahead. 

[0:27:54] LCK: Thanks so much for having us, Tim. 

[0:27:56] BB: Thank you.

[DISCLAIMER]

[0:27:58] ANNOUNCER: As we conclude this week’s podcast, an important reminder that the content on this show is provided to you for informational purposes only and is not intended to provide and should not be relied on for investment or any other advice. Information in the podcast and corresponding material should not be construed as a solicitation or offer to buy or sell any investment or related financial products. We urge listeners to consult with a financial advisor with respect to any investment.

Furthermore, the information contained in our archived newsletters, blog posts and podcasts is not updated and may not be accurate at the time you listen to it on the podcast. Opinions and analyses expressed herein are solely those of Your Financial Pharmacists, unless otherwise noted, and constitute judgments as of the dates published. Such information may contain forward-looking statements, which are not intended to be guarantees of future events. Actual results could differ materially from those anticipated in the forward-looking statements.

For more information, please visit yourfinancialpharmacist.com/disclaimer. Thank you again for your support of the Your Financial Pharmacist Podcast. Have a great rest of your week.

[END]

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