Optometrists Building Empires

Most guests on this show own practices. Dr. Fred Cho doesn't, and that's the reason to listen. Fred is a travel optometrist. He's licensed in Ontario, Manitoba, and Newfoundland, and he's built his career serving remote communities across Canada. University of Waterloo OD. He speaks on burnout, hosts the 20 Happy Podcast, and wrote a book called Redesigning Work. What he's building now is a team of travel optometrists. In his words, it's there "to address a multi-provincial doctor shortage in Canada." Honest status on that team: it isn't built yet. He's mid-build, still the doctor on the road himself, taking consulting work alongside it. I open every episode the same way. "What was the most important thing that helped you build your empire?" Fred didn't hesitate. Burnout. He said burnout is "forever linked" to his professional story, and that it "forced a change" onto him. He didn't choose the pivot. It chose him. My own read, and I said it to him on the episode: plenty of doctors who burn out are done. They move on to something else. Fred is the rarer case. He stayed and rebuilt the work around the thing that almost ended it. What an owner can take from this: 1. Coverage is a supply channel, not a favor. Fred's answer to a doctor shortage was to organize travel optometrists instead of waiting for one to move to town. If you've burned a quarter trying to staff a second location, that's a channel most owners have never priced out. 2. Burnout is a business risk, not a character flaw. Fred puts it at the center of his whole career story. If you wait until a doctor resigns to deal with it, you're treating the symptom. 3. The doctors you want to hire are comparing your job to a life, not to other jobs. That's what Fred speaks and writes about. Ownership is one route to a career that fits. Three provincial licenses and a mix of roles is another one, and it's competing with your posting. 4. Not every empire has walls. Fred doesn't own a chair. He's licensed in three provinces and building a team for communities on the wrong end of that shortage. Useful mirror if you've only ever counted growth in locations and chairs. About the guest: Dr. Fred H. Cho. Travel optometrist and consultant, speaker on burnout, host of the 20 Happy Podcast, author of Redesigning Work. Hosted by Ankit Patel on Optometrists Building Empires.