Petty, Michel & Associates
Who We Are and What We Do
Ed Petty, and Dave Michel
Letter from Ed Petty: June 2023
OUR COMPANY, PETTY, MICHEL AND ASSOCIATES, is the oldest consultancy of its type in the country and provides a unique practice development service to chiropractors and other health professionals.
I guess it all started when I began working with a chiropractor in San Francisco in the 1980s. The doctor wanted me to help him organize his office and work with his associates. I did not know then that he ran one of the largest chiropractic clinics in the world. He had many associate doctors, at least 8, two partners, and 28 separate adjusting rooms.
He started a consultancy for chiropractors and other types of health professionals (dentists, podiatrists, MD's, etc.). I helped him with this, and, along with Dr. Jim Sigafoose, we traveled across the country delivering seminars and in-office consultations. As a result, I had the opportunity to work with many doctors as well as those in his office. To provide better service to the clients, we asked Dave Michel, the smartest guy I knew, to be the regional consultant and director for the Midwest. He accepted and did a superb job.
After a few years, the doctor realized that consulting was not for him. So, he sold his consultancy (not his chiropractic business), which prompted me to move to Wisconsin for family reasons, and Dave and I began our business as Petty, Michel & Associates in 1988.
This story is relevant because Dave and I both saw what was possible in a chiropractic business. When I left San Francisco, the doctor’s company was seeing over 2200 visits—per week. But what’s more, he was out of the office for weeks, even months, each year. And though he has since passed, the office continues as his legacy.
The image of a multiple-doctor business, with associates and partners, well organized, never left our mind.
In 1990, we started an allied company called Chiro-Health Management Services, Inc., and, through it, opened or bought 22 practices here in Wisconsin.
This was a risky adventure, and I wouldn’t recommend it to most. We did well, but only because we worked hard and already had significant experience from our work in the field. We helped 22 doctors get started and succeed in their practices which they eventually purchased, and we went back to focusing on consulting.
Here is a chart of office visits for the offices we built and bought before we started selling them to the doctors who worked there. (The top number is 8,046 Visits for the month of October.)
Our specialty was and is providing growth-minded doctors with a more thorough and personal support program beyond seminars. Seminars have always been the conventional form of practice development. While they are helpful, we have found, and most doctors confess, that after a month or two, offices usually return to their pre-seminar status. In other words, nothing much changes.
Our tagline says it all: When Seminars Aren’t Enough!
From all our marketing experience, I put together a 400-page set of binders called the Marketing Manager System, which we later digitized and sold on CD’s. (Currently out of print but available to clients on our coaching program on a private site.)
Continually refining our practice development procedures over the years as we worked with clients across the country, I put them down in a book I wrote called the Goal Driven Business. It lays out the Goal Driven System.
Our goal has always been the same – to build up the practice to its full capacity and stabilize it so that the business owner can continue to cruise and accumulate wealth, or clone themselves to bring on other doctors, or sell it.
And our approach has always been the same – when we work with an office, we are on board. We join the team as a full-on stakeholder. We get to know you, your team, your town, your office, and sometimes your whole family! On our private coaching program, we visit you and your team… at your office.
And while the goal and approach are the same, we now have a streamlined system to help the office develop faster and more profitably. We call this system the Goal Driven System.
Our programs are not for the fledgling office or those that are comfortable where they are. We happily recommend seminar programs and other services which can be useful to all practices.
But for doctors who have grown beyond their start-up model, who are experiencing organizational barriers, and who are still growth-minded, we provide the unique management support you need.
You may not want 28 adjusting rooms or open and run 25 offices, but whatever your dreams are, we’re the ones who have the experience and the system to take you there.
We only work with a few business owners at a time. If you are interested in management training or private coaching, please contact me and let’s talk.
Ed Petty