Paul has been part of the PSS family for 3 years now. He is our man on the ground in New Zealand, and consistently gets fantastic feedback from his clients and buyers. What do people really know about the man behind the deals?
Where is he from? What does he do in his spare time? We decided to interview Paul to give our clients a chance to get to know her a little better.
Where are you from and where did you grow up?
I grew up in a small town about a half an hour out of Wellington, called Paremata. It’s a harbour village so, like my father, I did a lot of sailing, boating, fishing and surfing. Like most New Zealanders, I started playing rugby at the age of six for my local club Paremata Plimmerton, where my grandfather helped build the club rooms, which are still standing. I attended Plimmerton school and then went to Tawa College. I loved all sports and spent more time on that than studying. When I left school, I did an electrical apprenticeship; my father had an electrical business in Wellington and as a teenager I always spent time in the holidays pulling wires, so it made sense working in that field.
How did you get into the dental industry? Tell us a bit about your career history before Practice Sale Search?
After completing my apprenticeship and working in various electrical fields, I wanted to get into sales, as I felt I had the gift of the gab, or that’s what my parents kept telling me, lol! I never stopped talking. A dental company was advertising for a technical salesperson, to sell and install Dental Chairs and X-ray Equipment. In 1984 I started my career in the Dental Industry, installing the high-end German brand, Kavo. Most of my career I have followed Kavo; it’s such a great product.
From 1989 to 2003 I lived in Sydney, working with Hearder and Greenaway, Gunz Dental Supply, and then moved to Ivoclar, as they had the Kavo agency. I ran their NSW operation as Equipment manager, and then acted as Branch manager for nine years.
I decided to head back to New Zealand in 2003 to spend time with my ailing father. Ebos held the Kavo brand in NZ and I soon started as the NZ manager for them, running a large team of keen sales staff. Globally Kavo made a shift to Henry Schein and Ebos and Kavo was sold to Henry Schein Shalfoon, where I worked for a number of years. I had made numerous contacts throughout Australia and New Zealand, and it wasn’t long for an opportunity to come up to run Dentsply New Zealand, another company that had high-end products for the dental consumer.
My role was made redundant when Dentsply and Sirona merged, so I thought, what am I going to do now? I had been in the Dental field for over half my life so knew this is where I wanted to be…and along came Practice Sale Search.
How do you think that your background gives you a different perspective when dealing with dental practice sales?
I think that my 34 years of experience in the dental industry helps me understand the different elements in a dental practice far better than someone without this experience. When I look at a dental practice, I can see how it works, where the bottlenecks and opportunities are.
Having built up a career and thriving business units over decades, and then needing to move on…I understand the emotional attachment that a selling dentist has to their patients and staff and the pride they feel for what they have created… I felt the same way when I moved on from my previous roles. I understand the mixed emotions of passing on the legacy of something that you have created to someone else.
What do you like about Selling dental practices?
Dentists are highly intelligent and highly trained individuals and yet I feel that we, at Practice Sale Search, are helping dentists with a part of their careers that their training and experience have not prepared them for at all. A transaction that, if done correctly can make a massive difference to their lifestyle post sale and retirement.
When we are talking with our clients about practice sales, I can see the relief their faces as we provide structure to something that has been vague and unpredictable for them. They really open up and appreciate our guidance and help, that’s the part I like!
What do you like to do outside of work?
Outside of work, that’s easy, my passion is fishing! I have an 8 metre motorboat and any chance I can get, I’m out there trying my luck. My wife enjoys it as well and usually catches more and larger fish than me, but I’m working on that! I also enjoy cooking and, of course, fine wine.
Tell us something that people would be surprised to learn about you
Back in 1989, when I moved to Sydney, I was involved in a major motor vehicle accident. I was on a bus heading to visit my brother in Queensland, when at 3am on a wet morning, a bus coming the other way collided with our bus, killing 36 people, Australia’s worst bus incident. Two hours before the accident I moved to the back of the bus, which saved my life.
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