Optometrists Building Empires

Viola Kanevsky: first of all, I didn't expect to be an optometrist.

Ankit Patel: Okay.

Viola Kanevsky: Um, I, um, was pre-med in college and came home one day and told my mom that I was quitting and wanted to go to art school. At the same time as you know, we were opening. We got sued by the private equity people for breach of implied verbal non-compete,

I, I also thought it was something people paid for, so I ignored the. First, like 10 phone calls that they, they, um, called to let me know. And then I started having colleagues call to congratulate me and I was like, this is some kind of nonsense.

Ankit Patel: Today's guest is someone I'm thrilled to have on the show.

She's a specialist in custom contact lenses, children's vision, and a leader in advancing optometric care and education. She's a past president of New York State Optometric Association and has served in national and local leadership roles with the American Optometric Association, the Optometric Society of the City of New York, and Women of Optometry.

She was named number one, optometrist in the nation on America's best eye Doctors list in 2022 and has PR practice on Han's Upper West Side for over 30 years. She's founder of Acuity, NYC. Please welcome Dr. Uh Viola Ksky. Viola, welcome.

Viola Kanevsky: Nice to meet you

Ankit Patel: Yeah, you too. Yeah, I'm, I'm, I'm excited about this conversation. So, uh, what was the most important thing that helped you grow your empire?

Viola Kanevsky: so I'm gonna have to say, you know, a positive attitude, um, but also family. Um, my mom, who is an incredible role model for me, um, and will be turning 80 this year and is still working. Really has always has gone through so many hardships in her life and a difficult immigration and has always supported me and both financially and emotionally through my journey in building a career and building And my husband who has also been just very positive. And no matter what crazy idea I come up with, he always says, sure, yes dear. So, and that's how we roll.

Ankit Patel: That's funny. That's how I stay married too. So it's, I like it. Uh, and so, um. You, you, you've been in practice for a long time. Really long, long lot longevity. With, with that, I'm curious, uh, you know, you got the title of Best Optometrist in 2022. How, how did that come about? Just curious.

Viola Kanevsky: Good question. I think there was some kind of voting mishap. I

Ankit Patel: Hmm.

Viola Kanevsky: That site, um. Just so you know, I wasn't always in my own practice. Um, I'll tell you a little bit more about my journey, but, uh, I believe that's, that's a survey that's done that asks both opt, ophthalmologists, optometrists, as well as patients rank a doctor that they would trust or refer to.

And somehow that happened. I have a feeling a lot of it has to do with the fact that I. prolifically on various, uh, Facebook groups. Um, and you know, you know how it is you vote for a name that you recognize

Ankit Patel: Yeah. Well, I, I wouldn't sell yourself short. I think you are an expert in the field. So I think, um, is so, it is interesting 'cause I think we had this conversation in the prep call. I thought it was something that people paid for, but it turns out No, it is, it is like something that someone nominated you.

Yeah. Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: I, I also thought it was something people paid for, so I ignored the. First, like 10 phone calls that they, they, um, called to let me know. And then I started having colleagues call to congratulate me and I was like, this is some kind of nonsense. So I kept deleting it and reporting junk, you know, when they text you and email you. and then turns out that finally they got through to me and I said, I'm not paying for any of this. And they said, no, no, no. This is not a paid thing. I was like, oh, okay.

Ankit Patel: Uh, well, that's pretty high praise. And, and so as you went through your journey in honing your craft, uh, in, in the journey as an optometrist, what was something that came up that was difficult as you were growing that you didn't expect?

Viola Kanevsky: Well, first of all, I didn't expect to be an optometrist.

Ankit Patel: Okay.

Viola Kanevsky: Um, I, um, was pre-med in college and came home one day and told my mom that I was quitting and wanted to go to art school. She promptly grabbed me by the collar and marched me right back and said, no daughter of mine is gonna be dependent on any man. So you need to go into a career where you will always be assured of a job no matter what country you're in or what the situation is. I said, okay. But at the time, you know, we were immigrants. I couldn't, we were no longer immigrants, but we had immigrated to the United States and I was. out of money and did not want to go into debt, um, for school. So I kind of looked around. I had gone with my dad to his eye exam um, his optometrist went on and on and on about how much he loved his life. I didn't actually know what optometrist was, but he went on about how much he had loved his career and loved coming to work every day, and that I should really look into it. So I kind of did. Um, my grandmother on my father's side, uh, was a pediatrician in the Soviet Union. I knew I kind of always wanted to do something with pediatrics. um, I looked into it and I said, oh, it's only four years and, you know, possible residency. And, um, I, I was a New York State resident, there was a state school, so I kind of looked at that and said, all right, I'll apply there.

I can afford that tuition. And that's where I wound up being

Ankit Patel: Oh, it's exciting. It's funny, it's like a happy, uh, happy circumstance. So.

Viola Kanevsky: Yeah. And also I kind of liked it because it was the only one of the professions at that time. There was no, uh, retinal photography and I really liked to draw.

Ankit Patel: Nice.

Viola Kanevsky: have that color pencils that I used to draw retinas with,

Ankit Patel: Oh wow. That's, uh, yeah, that's, that's, that's old school for sure. So you could probably still rescope someone and get a refraction, so,

Viola Kanevsky: I, I use that retina scope every day. If you're

Ankit Patel: yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: I can't do it any other way.

Ankit Patel: That's cool. Uh, that's, that's pretty interesting. I, you know, I was always, I'm always amazed by folks that can do that. I'm not an optometrist, my wife is. And so, um, it's kind of a cool skill.

People just pop it out and be like, oh yeah, your, your x, y, Z prescription probably. So it's kinda cool. Uh, so, so what made you want to start your own practice and grow your business and, and really hone your craft with your own practice versus staying in, you know, with someone else?

Viola Kanevsky: Uh, so my, when I first graduated, uh, like many students today, I had to pay back loans and. And try to figure out what I wanted to do. So I worked probably like four different jobs that year, uh, in a couple of private practices, in a couple of opticals in an ophthalmology office, and just to figure out what I wanted to do, but also to learn from other people's mistakes. And, um, just to see how other people ran their business. Because as you probably know, we we're clinically very well trained in optometry school, but. The business end of it is completely nego, neglected.

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: No practice management to speak of. So it turned out that within that year, I realized right away that one of the locations where I was working, which what happened to be a retail storefront, optical was both conveniently located to where I lived allowed me independence, meaning I, I immediately, um, spoke to the owner of that, uh, optical and said, I don't want a salary. I will just take my patient fees and after a certain amount each day, I'll pay you back. We'll split it in half and that'll be kind of rent. And that was a very unusual arrangement at that time. And he kind of shrugged his shoulders and thought that I was an idiot for doing that and said, great, you know, I don't have to pay you a salary.

That's great. And that's what we did for 14 years. It was quite successful that point. Um, he, it was, it had then been, I think like he had expanded to about seven locations. managing some of the other optometrists in the prac in in chain, and he sold to um, what is now called private equity.

But at that time was venture capital they were actually from Canada. I think the last business they had bought were a bunch of beer breweries. They decided to go into the optical field and immediately came in and started telling me I wasn't seeing enough patients per hour. I was focusing too heavily on pediatrics, all sorts of things that I didn't like, and I left and I left with, um, one of the opticians we opened our own little tiny location, also retail storefront because that's all I knew at the time.

That's what I knew how to build and. year after we opened that, we hung a sign in the door that said closed getting married, and that, that we were at that location for 10 years until our lease ran now, and then bought a space on Central Park West across the street from Tavern on the Green, which makes for great after dinner drinks and uh, that's where we are today.

Ankit Patel: Yeah, that's pretty, that's a pretty cool story. Um, what, what was it, uh, when you, when you went to practice ownership, what are some of the things that, that came up that surprised you that you didn't expect as you started growing your own individual practice and. Spending time in your practice.

Viola Kanevsky: Well, the opening was absolutely terrifying, uh, because at the same time as you know, we were opening. We got sued by the private equity people for breach of implied verbal non-compete, which,

Ankit Patel: Okay.

Viola Kanevsky: Got thrown out. Um, and you know, although it cost us some legal fees, the judge's decision was that I actually could not leave my records with them because that would be abandonment of patients.

So they had to shut down all like three locations where I had worked, separate the charts and give me all my charts and I, and. If I wanted to leave copies for them, which I did because I didn't want my patients to go have, you know, to have to look for their charts. they had to pay for those. So actually out to my benefit that they sued me.

But as you can imagine, it was quite nerve wracking. Certainly didn't expect that at the same time as we had kind of signed, you know, very expensive Manhattan lease. Um. We're flying by the seat of our pants and kind of really didn't have a lot of idea of what we were doing. How were we gonna do it? Where were we gonna get the money for it? So we hired some friends who were artists to build out the space virtually overnight. We kind of worked by night. we opened, I think we got, if I remember correctly, a three month build out, no rent. And we opened in one month, less, less than a month really. And that first day that we opened was the biggest day we had money-wise to this day, because a lot of my patients came in and everyone bought something just to support us.

They were so

Ankit Patel: Wow.

Viola Kanevsky: you know, that I was going into my own business. And, um, we, we finished that day. We, our furniture hadn't come in yet. We had like. any equipment. It was just literally the two of us. The phones were ringing off the hook. We were, I was seeing patients while helping patients in the front, taking phone calls. It was nuts. And we kind of closed the door on that one day and said, I guess we're gonna be okay. We had made the rent for the entire month,

Ankit Patel: Well, that's good.

Viola Kanevsky: not

Ankit Patel: That's good. It's,

Viola Kanevsky: from Manhattan.

Ankit Patel: yeah, I can imagine. And you know, it's, um, um, that's a pretty cool story, I think, and that, that must have been scary going in like that.

Viola Kanevsky: actually terrifying. And then of course a few years after that, there was a big market crash

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: In New York, if you remember, I forget what year it

Ankit Patel: W which one? Right

Viola Kanevsky: 90 something, I

Ankit Patel: now It was a.com bubble then, right?

Viola Kanevsky: 2008. 2008 I

Ankit Patel: 2008, the housing crisis bubble. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: Yes. So that was that huge crash. Um. We were terrified that business will go down.

How will we pay the rent? Uh, because the rent does not decrease. No one stops the rent

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: Um, we were okay. We survived that one. Um, and of course, New York and our patient base is very heavily dependent on the stock market. You know,

Ankit Patel: Hmm.

Viola Kanevsky: Way the stock market goes is the way the business goes. People are doing well in the stock market. Businesses do well, and if it's not, we don't. Um, and then. Then of course the next scariest thing was the pandemic, which happened shortly after we opened the new practice. Um, but happily, I also, my staff as, as we added staff to the practice, I've actually never had to fire anyone and I'm still working with, so we now have three opticians, uh, one optometrist, and I've never, I've worked with these people.

They're almost like my family at this point never really had to fire anyone, which is lovely.

Ankit Patel: Wow.

Viola Kanevsky: So we survived the pandemic. I actually continued, I did not lay anyone off. I didn't furlough anyone. I continued to pay their salaries out of my savings at that time. Um, and they were lovely and continue to work from home and call patients.

And we kind of managed, you know, when you're small, an advantage of that is that you can pivot very rapidly.

That time when everything was shut down, calling our patients and. Doing things like we, you know, I gave my staff a list of all of our patients who were over the age of 70

Ankit Patel: The high risk. Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: and sat there and called all them and make sure to make sure they were okay.

And some would say, oh, do you know where to get Lysol? And we'd say, sure, we'll get you some Lysol. You know, non-optometry related things.

But

it was Nice. And then we called of the urgent cares in our area and said, Hey, we can walk to work. And if you have emergencies, I can see them. 'cause I can go into my office by myself and just see patients one-on-one. And was an enormous source of referrals for us and they continue to refer after that.

Ankit Patel: That, that is incredible. I think, um, you're very humble 'cause like with some of the things you're describing are really, really hard things to do in business. So, uh, you, you basically had a crash course and, uh, build out and, and rushing to try to get a business while trying to, you know, people trying to sue you.

Uh, and you know, and then on top of that you had like a couple of crashes. But the COVID one is brilliant. Um, calling the urgent care centers or saying that we can be referral source and. Yeah, that was really cool how you, I, I like how you reached out to the patient. That's a level of care in the community that you don't see very often.

Viola Kanevsky: You know, I, like the optometrist that I went to with my dad.

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: Do have to say I really have loved my work. You know how people say, like, if you love your. Work. It's not really

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: Um, it is work that's a lie. And I can't say that like every single day is fantastic. Of course, there are patients that drive us all crazy once in a while, but for the most part, I do love my patients.

They've been very supportive over the years, and it's pleasant to, right. We're in this field because we like to care for people I find that pleasant and fulfilling and makes me happy at the end of the day. Right. So it, it was, it made us feel good. It made us feel. Like, we could do something during the pandemic.

Otherwise, you feel that you sit there and you feel helpless. And of course, if you remember, no one knew what the heck was going on,

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: Virus was passed, if we're all gonna die tomorrow. So if we're all gonna die tomorrow, I figured, well, at least let's go down together and, you know, feeling good about each other and feeling good about the community.

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: It, it, it was really, it was nice because. A lot of people just had questions.

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: Looked to us as medical professionals and no one else was giving 'em information, and it was nice to have that community.

Ankit Patel: Yeah. And I'm getting this, this thread, uh, a constant thread across your stories and is, is care. You care about your patients, you care about the community, you care about the business, you care about your staff. I, I do wanna touch on that. You really haven't had to, you haven't really lost a employee. Like, uh, tell me more about that.

'cause that's, that's, people are struggling with that.

Viola Kanevsky: Won

Ankit Patel: one. Okay.

Viola Kanevsky: years, um, but she fired herself so.

Ankit Patel: Okay, but, but you've had employees for a very long time it sounds like.

Viola Kanevsky: even like, you know, one of, one of my, uh, techs is the, do I mean, she's, she's still around. She is a daughter of one of my opticians.

Ankit Patel: Oh, wow.

Viola Kanevsky: For us for many years. I thought she'd go to optometry school and she left actually to open her own practice, but we're still in touch and, you know, she comes and fills in when we need her. Uh, but I've never really had to really fire anyone. Um, there, staff is lovely and they also care about the patients. They also enjoy coming to work. So I mean, there are times when, like during the pandemic, they were calling and begging to come into work. I'm like, no, no, no. Stay home. I don't know how this virus passes yet.

Like, I'll, I'll let you know when I need you.

Ankit Patel: Uh, and

Viola Kanevsky: that. They'll fill in for me when I'm sick.

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: You know, it's, I.

Ankit Patel: That's incredible. Uh, how do you foster that culture? So if someone's listening to this and say, I, I wanna be able to do that, you know, with my staff. How, how do you, how do you, can you kind of tell us your secret sauce?

Viola Kanevsky: You know, when you work in a small space, you have to be, I think, cognizant of people's needs

Ankit Patel: Hmm.

Viola Kanevsky: Um, really treat them like you would treat your family or perhaps better than you would treat your family. We don't fight as much.

Ankit Patel: It depends on your family, right?

Viola Kanevsky: Everyone is cross-trained,

Ankit Patel: Okay.

Viola Kanevsky: Which has, which is, has not only the benefit of someone's out sick, anyone can cover, but also everyone knows how hard the other person's job is, right?

So they re they all respect each other's jobs. There's not, you know, on a, if I walk into the bathroom and I see that it's dirty, I will absolutely pick up that toilet brush and clean the toilet. No, I'm not like the doctor and I don't do that. and they do the same, right? So it's, no, nothing is beneath anyone. everyone does everything. Um, so I think that makes for mutual respect. Uh, I certainly, I've always tried to have all of the staff because they have families and I respect that they, I want them to have family time. I always try to have no one work more than four days a week.

Ankit Patel: Hmm.

Viola Kanevsky: Adequate time spend with their families. Um, they tr they really treasure that and I think appreciate that. I try as best as I can to offer health insurance for

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: For it so that they're covered, which is important. Um, we have an annual staff retreat, which everyone loves. There's a resort about an hour and 45 minutes from the city called Mohan Kaus, which is my happy place.

I love it there. Like, we just had one this year. We go up with the staff, we all drive up together. I'll do some kind of training over breakfast. Then we all hike up the mountain. They repeat back to me what I taught them. We have lunch up there, come back down, everyone has massages and hang out for a while and chat.

Then we have an early dinner and then my associate presents something. they repeat it back to her and then, uh, we let. husband do his, we call it Doug's gripes and grumbles. So he actually has a list of what is everyone upset about in the practice and how do we fix it? um, it, and then we come back together and it's like a really nice relaxing day.

We close the practice for the day. It's only once a year, but I find that when you try to train your staff or have meetings during patient time, it's virtually impossible 'cause the phones ring. And I think as much as I've tried to do that, and I think it's important.

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: Very hard to do in a small practice,

Ankit Patel: Yeah,

Viola Kanevsky: up neglecting that.

And so just setting aside specific time to do that with your staff, even if it's just once a year, is really, really important to build that team.

Ankit Patel: yeah. I like that. tell me a Little bit more about that exercise your husband does. I, I, so what I heard was that you give 'em a space to talk about what they want to change and, uh, like you said, gripe or, or I don't wanna put words in your mouth. Tell me about that.

Viola Kanevsky: Before, before each one of these retreats, about two weeks before, I ask all the staff to write down, uh, their, what they think their strengths and weaknesses are. Actually, I asked 'em to write down what their weaknesses are and then everyone has to write down what everyone else's strengths are. And then if anyone has any, we call it gripes and grumbles. If anyone has any pet peeves about whatever in the office, like leaving your dirty cups in the sink, or you know, any really anything that bothers anyone, I ask 'em to write that down. And then we kind of present it at the retreat. Uh, we call Doug's gripes and grumbles. Gru, excuse me, Doug's gripes and grumbles. It's a mouthful. and actually this year he said he had none, so we skipped it. But it's, know, generally it's little things, but kind of like in a marriage where, you know, throwing your dirty socks on the floor, leaving the toilet seat up eventually drives couples crazy in a small practice. I think little things drive people crazy, and it's important to acknowledge them and try to fix them before they become this really major annoyance.

Right.

Ankit Patel: Yeah, that, I like that. That gives us space for that. It, it's almost like, it's interesting because a lot of this sounds like a function of just being so close together 'cause it's small spaces.

Viola Kanevsky: And also I think, um, having your employees and yourself list your own weaknesses and point out other people's strengths, think makes it safe because, and people are pretty good at pointing out at knowing what their own weaknesses are. if you ask them to do that, they will try to correct them, do it the other way becomes almost accusatory, right?

If I say, well, I think you need to improve this and you needed to improve that, then it becomes a directive for me. I kind of used to do that with my kids, right when they were little instead of, uh, my telling them, okay, it's time for you to go practice Instead, we had a schedule on the wall that said. Okay, three o'clock you have to do this and four o'clock you have to do your homework or whatever it is. And we go to the refrigerator and say, oh, what does the refrigerator say? It's time for this and this now. And they'd help write the schedule themselves. So it was never mom yelling at them to tell them what to do so that they could say, no, I don't wanna do that.

Right. It was more they wrote the schedule, they, they had control over it, so now they're gonna go and do it. So, and I know my, I don't, I'm not, not to say that my staff are children. Or behave like children, but I think it gives them ownership

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: Of their own faults and method to correct it. And also I think ownership in the practice.

Ankit Patel: Yeah, I like that. Um, and, and, um, so. Tell me a little bit about what you're excited about in the future of the profession, of your practice. What are you looking forward to in the next, let's say, the next 30 years of optometry and, and, you know, as you, as you, uh, you know, do in your second half of your career?

Viola Kanevsky: Oh gosh. Um, well, lumps, bumps and lasers

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: On the agenda. Um, as we fight to expand our scope. My own career has changed so much that in the 30 years, 30 plus years I've been practicing. You know, I started, I was the first class to be grandfathered into topical medications in New York. Um, and then of course we got glaucoma and now we have orals.

And, you know, because we're a legislative professional, we've been fighting for that. And I've certainly been going to Albany every year for 30 some years, and then Washington, DC to lobby for that. Uh, so to protect our scope and to expand our scope has been both challenging but also exciting. And it also means that I can stay at the very cutting edge of my profession. All my professional life, can probably call it functional, a DDI get readily, easily bored with any one thing, so I'm always trying to add new things to the practice. I'm always an early adopter. I love technology, I love toys, so I'm always excited to see what the next thing will be. Um, I'm certainly very excited to, uh, begin negotiations for buy-in for my younger associate. She's been with us for three years now and we're just entered those negotiations so. I, I look forward to having her as a partner. and of course, you know, one day I look forward to retiring too.

Ankit Patel: One day. Well, it, you know, it's, it's kind of cool. I like, I like the fact that, you know, you do a lot of, um, you publish a lot. So it sounds like you have a lot of, um, uh, uh, ways that you've, you've kind of shared your knowledge and insights, so I, you know, it'd be kind of cool, just selfishly, uh, what you do around the culture seems really interesting and different.

So, uh, with your patients, with your community, with your staff, all that seems to be very, a unique perspective. So I appreciate you sharing that.

Viola Kanevsky: Yeah, it's, I, I, I've really loved it. It's been fun.

Ankit Patel: Yeah. Excellent. let's shift gears a little bit. You, you've kind of told me a couple, but I'd like to hear what you feel was a story that was very formative for you. Uh, maybe another one that you haven't shared yet, something that made you who you are. And it could have been, like I said, it could have been when you were a younger kid, or it could have been more recent.

Viola Kanevsky: When I was about, I wanna say three years old, my grandfather brought me this really beautiful doll from Germany that had eyes that opened and closed, I remember being desperate to figure out they worked. So, um, sadly, this doll had both eyes excavated out of her head very shortly with a screwdriver. My mother was horrified at this.

Ankit Patel: She's like, oh my goodness, I have a psychopath as a child. Yeah. No.

Viola Kanevsky: I was a psychopath as a child.

Ankit Patel: No. Oh, no. Al I'm not seriously. Oh, that's a,

Viola Kanevsky: formative years as a, as a young budding optometrist,

Ankit Patel: oh, that, that's that, that it was in your future, right? I'll, he studying about eyes. That's cool. Uh, it's a, it's a very curious kid to do that.

Viola Kanevsky: I did a lot of crazy stuff. We were also, I think the first ones on our, in our block to have a tv. In the Soviet Union there was, you know, in the Soviet Union there were like maybe three TV shows, right in the evening there was news in the morning, there was some program for the elderly, and in the afternoon there was a little children's program and there were these, I think a little, if I remember correctly, a little puppet show or something that went on.

And of course I took the TV apart as well because I wanted to get the little men out of the television and free them.

Ankit Patel: That's cool. So you've always been almost like an engineer at heart.

Viola Kanevsky: Yeah, my mom was not very happy with that either.

Ankit Patel: Oh, that one's a little more expensive. Yeah, that's, uh, especially back then when TVs more, were a little more scarce and the big ones with the cathode ray twos and, yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: Yeah. But I think, you know, more seriously it, the fact that we traveled so much as immigrants as a child was very formative for me. I learned to both be resilient and. Just not afraid of change because we went, you know, starting from age four, we till I was 12, right? Until we got to New York. We basically, I changed schools almost every year. And so I had to learn a new language, be the new kid in class. Um, every year was something different. New town, new school, new new place to live. Um, often I had to, uh, translate for my parents because of course as a child I learned the language faster than they, than they would. So if they went to a store, I would've to translate for them and so forth.

So you kind of learn to navigate the world and not be afraid of change. I was actually a very, very shy child. I remember hiding behind my mother. Like going onto the

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: And she would pull me out and make me say hello to the bus driver and I, and I'd like whisper, hello. You know, she's like, no louder. He has to hear you. Right. So, um, you, you learn, right? You, it is not, not, I wouldn't say that your personality changes, you can learn to overcome shyness. Right. I remember one of the. Most difficult things I've ever had to do as a student, as an optometry student was that first day that you come out and your first patient in your exam room, it's like, think about it.

It's terrifying. You have to walk out, shake hands with a complete stranger

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: And take them into a room and talk to them, when in fact you're shy and don't really know what you're doing, and you have to do that 16 times a day every day for the rest of your life. you, you really have to learn how to speak up and say hello and smile.

Doesn't matter how you feel. Doesn't matter what happened at home that day or what's going on in the news. You have to be there and present for that patient and put on a happy face. and so I think all that immigration and traveling that happened really helped me to do that.

Ankit Patel: Nice. That's pretty, uh, I, I love this story. Thank you for sharing those. And let's say, knowing what you know now, what advice or experience share would you give your younger self about a week out of optometry school?

Viola Kanevsky: Oh, you know, my only regret, um, is I wish I have a classmate. I very much respect, who also does pediatrics. And we, we lecture together and we do a lot of stuff together. We go to conferences together, we've sort of on boards together. I really wish that instead of waiting 14 years to open my own practice, we had just from day one started cold together, um, with nothing.

Because it's the easiest way to have a partner before anyone has anything. Right? There's nothing to divide, kind of like a marriage when you start with nothing. and I think we would've been quite successful and. Four times as big, right? He works in a large, uh, pediatric ophthalmology practice. I have my own practice, but we could have easily done that. Of course, at this point our careers is a little bit late, but I do wish we had done that and I often will tell younger students what I mentor them, that don't be afraid if, if private practice is something that you want, go for it. Find that friend in school that you respect and you think is smart and wants the same thing, and just go for it. The money will come.

Ankit Patel: I love that. That's great insight. Uh, you know, it's funny, uh, we hear that a lot in the podcast. Uh, for, from folks who didn't open up right away or really close to the beginning, they're like, yeah, I what wish I would've done it sooner. Taken more chances or, yeah. That's, it's, it, it seems to be a common thread.

Viola Kanevsky: Our profession, if you think about it, why does venture capital try to buy optometry practices so frequently?

Ankit Patel: Medical in general, right? Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: what,

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: What's your options, right? You have money, you wanna invest. You can put it in the stock market and if you're conservative, you'll make 5%. If you're very aggressive, you'll make eight. Or you can put, or you buy treasury bonds, right? Which, who know, who knows what happens with those. But if you buy a medical practice, that's a basically, given return at easily, at least 10% on your money.

Ankit Patel: Yeah.

Viola Kanevsky: They don't go out of business. They're pretty safe. So why should you know banks will loan you money.

So just do it. You'll make the money back.

Ankit Patel: Yeah. Yeah. And a lot easier to get loans for for doctors than it is non-doctors for sure. So, well, cool. Well, uh, uh. Viola, where can people find you if they wanna reach out to you?

Viola Kanevsky: Uh, you are welcome to email me. It's viola@acuitynyc.com. you're welcome to come visit me. Just gimme a heads up. On my practice on the Upper West Side, uh, again, right across the street from Tavern on the Green. if you are in New York and wanna go to a great conference, I will be at Innovation Vision Conference in Syracuse shortly. Um, always at the a OA conferences, you know, if there's a meeting somewhere, I'm likely to be there.

Ankit Patel: Likely speaking. Excellent. So. Well, uh, Dr. Uh, Viola Ksky, thank you so much for being on the podcast.

Viola Kanevsky: My pleasure. Thank you so much for giving me a call.

Ankit Patel: Yeah, and a couple of my takeaways from this, I really learned a lot. I love the gripes and grumbles. I love the, you take care to hone the level. When you told me that story about, Hey, what do you need? You need Lysol wipes, great. We'll get that for you. Even though we have no, you know, that's not really what we do, but we'll do that anyways for you as a patient.

And I love the ownership piece of it. Everyone takes ownership when they feel like they have a piece of uh, uh, responsibility. So thank you for sharing some of those lessons with the, with the, with the audience.

Viola Kanevsky: My pleasure.

Ankit Patel: Yeah. And thank you audience. And if you learn something or laughed, uh, share this podcast with a friend and make sure you hit the, the subscribe button and so you never miss an episode.

And if you use the HubSpot link in the show meeting notes, I'll send you a free copy of my book. Optometry Redefined. Thank you again, uh, Viola, for being on the show. Uh, this has been another exciting episode of Optometrists Building Empires, and we'll see you next time.