What an un-retired doctor once taught me

“Well, that just doesn’t make any sense whatsoever. According to our contracts, we are entitled to attend that continuing education meeting.”

My colleague, let’s call him “Dr. R” for short, had spoken up at a meeting with our commanding officer. He and I were among a group of civilian contractor dentists working on a military post in Germany.

We were only one of four types of employees, each with a different set of rules, responsibilities, and benefits. Also at this post were “GS” employees (American civilian federal employees), Local nationals (German civilian employees), and of course, active duty military members.

We met every so often with our Officer In Charge (OIC for short- they love their acronyms) to discuss larger issues. This meeting had gotten heated.

The OIC said that civilian contractors would be required to stay behind and man the dental clinic while the rest of the employees would drive to another military base for a day of free continuing education (CE).

Myself and the rest of the civilian dentists shifted in our seats. We knew that went against the terms of our contract; we were actually entitled to that CE. Many of us were counting on it for maintenance of our licensure. But for whatever reason, we were unable to point this out. We caught each other’s eyes across the table, but no one volunteered to speak up.

Of course, except for Dr. R.

Dr. R stood up and firmly explained why we would all being going to the CE event and that would mean shutting down the clinic for the day. He was calm and rational. He was reasonable. He had no fear of consequences.

Why?

Because he had more money than God.

Dr. R, had, in his own words, “failed at retirement”. A few years after selling his practice, he got tired of golfing and driving around town in his Porsche. He missed interacting with patients and the purpose it brought him. He felt restless with nothing meaningful to do.

Which is why he decided to take a contracting position on a military base in Germany.

He and his wife had both been “military brats” and had grown up in Germany in the baby-boom era directly after WWII. Since he was antsy to be in a social environment but still wanted to travel, a contracting job abroad allowed him and his wife to do both. He didn’t really need the job, but he enjoyed it and he and his wife got to re-live all of their high school memories and travels.

In FIRE parlance, this man had what we called “FU” money.

Dr. R’s interaction with the OIC happened prior to my career existential crisis, so I had no idea what FIRE or FU money were, but I did know I wanted to be like this guy.

I went home that night wondering why the hell I didn’t speak up. It would have been easy to say what Dr. R had said. But I couldn’t bring myself to do it. And, it wasn’t just me. None of the 30-something dentists had been willing to raise their hand and point out that we were CONTRACTUALLY OBLIGATED to receive continuing education. None of us had been willing to speak truth to power.

Why?

Because we needed our jobs.

We had astronomical student loan debt. Well-paying jobs in interesting locations did not abound. We were literally at the start of our careers and didn’t want to get fired for fear of not being able to get hired again. We didn’t speak up because we were afraid.

But Dr. R was confident and unafraid. If someone fired him, he could chuck deuces, pack up his Porsche, and continue on his merry way through Europe until he was on to the next thing. He wasn’t beholden to the OIC or to the job, he was there because he wanted to be there.

If I’m being honest, they needed him more that he needed them. In fact, he was a dental specialist that this particular clinic had not had in a long time, and was therefore in high demand. His schedule was always full, his assistants always busy. The American military members and their families were relieved that they could access his specialty without driving 3 hours away to a larger military base or taking their chances “on the economy” (which is lingo for trying to find a local German specialist).

This man could speak up without fear because his skills were in high demand and he had more cash than he could ever spend. He was working from a position of strength.

After I found a path to early retirement, this finally clicked for me. I realized that I couldn’t speak truth to power if I was afraid. As long as I needed income, I would have to bite my tongue. As long as I was in debt, I might have to tiptoe around an issue at work, or even deal with unfair or distasteful policies. And as a rather outspoken and mouthy broad from the East Coast, I knew I could only hold that in for so long.

Fast-forward about three years later. I was working in public health and had just paid off the balance of my student loans through participation in the National Health Service Corps. My husband and I had a savings rate of almost 70%, and a growing nest egg. If I lost my job, we not only knew how to live off of my husband’s lower salary, but we also had a huge pile of cash that could last us a while if we needed it to.

I finally had FU money.

And I needed to see how that shit worked.

While I look back fondly on my job in public health, we had a lot of daily challenges. So many of our challenges came from lack of funding or lack of creativity when using the funding.

These frustrations, these pain points, were beginning to get to me. For one, they prevented the practice from running smoothly. But the other and arguably most important issue was that anything that interfered with efficiency interfered with connecting an underserved population with health care.

So, I threw back my shoulders and got to work. Through the dedicated and constant help and insight from my team and other staff, I developed a strategy to implement better systems.  After all, we needed to make the most of the funding we did have, and without good systems, you waste time. And as we all know, time is money.

After 3 months or so of meeting with staff and crunching numbers, I typed up a strategy. Since I was already the main provider at the small clinic, I found ways to implement the strategy there. Even though we were smaller, we actually became more productive than the larger clinic.

At this point, I decided to set a meeting with our leadership. While I was able to show differences with the changes I made, I envisioned an even better future if we could replace our dismally outdated equipment and add another treatment room. Since I was also beginning to spend time in the larger clinic, I knew that their perennial headaches would likely be relieved with a few basic changes like the ones we were already doing at my clinic.

And you know what? I told them this. All of it without fear.

Which was saying something because the CEO was fond of reminding everyone that they were replaceable.

But I knew that I wasn’t replaceable. They needed people like me more than I needed people like them. And, I didn’t care if I got fired. I knew I could stand up for what I believed in. My skills were in high demand and I had enough cash that I wasn’t worried to speak up.

I was operating from a position of strength. Just like Dr. R.