IAM1855 – Pharmacist and Leadership Trainer Encourages People to be Their Best

• CEO Story: Dr. Dodd has an illustrious career as a pharmacist spanning 21 years, during which time she transitioned into full-time entrepreneurship after a 17-year stint in the pharmaceutical industry, serving in multiple roles within Medical Affairs. Currently, she is enrolled in the Institute of Functional Medicine, aiming to bring a functional perspective to the pharmaceutical management of patients.
• Business Service: At Your Pharmacy Advocate, LLC, Dr. Dodd focuses on leveraging her experience in pharmacy and leadership training to inspire people to be their best and make the most of every life opportunity.
• CEO Hack: Dr. Dodd recommends the book “No BS Time Management for Entrepreneurs.”
• CEO Nugget: She acknowledges that not all days are successful or easy; this is a part of the entrepreneurial journey.
• CEO Defined: For Dr. Dodd, being a CEO is both a responsibility and a privilege that involves leading clients and other business owners.

Dr. Jerrica Dodd Teaser 00:00

Why do you have hypertension? Why do you have diabetes? Why oftentimes in conventional medicine patients are given a prescription because of the symptoms that they're experiencing, but we're not really getting to the root of the problem?

Intro 00:16

Do you want to learn effective ways to build relationships, generate sales, and grow your business from successful entrepreneurs, startups, and CEOs without listening to a long, long, long interview?

If so, you've come to the right place. Gresham Harkless values your time and is ready to share with you precisely the information you're in search of.

This is the I AM CEO podcast.

Gresham Harkless 00:43

Hello. Hello. Hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO podcast and I appreciate you listening to this episode. If you've been listening this year, you know that we hit 1600 episodes at the beginning of this year. We're doing something a little bit different where we're repurposing our favorite episodes around certain categories, topics, or as I like to call them, business pillars that we think are going to be extremely impactful for CEOs, entrepreneurs, and business owners, or what I like to call the CB nation, architects who are looking to level up their organizations.

This month we are focused on leadership, management and coaching. When we think of leadership management and coaching, we often think of doing all of the other things, but often it's a person that's able to build up their team, that's able to cultivate a creative and innovative culture, so that people can excel and actually be their own leaders. So that's why this month we're focusing on those 3 big topics, because they make a huge impact on the organizations that we're part of.

Now, you'll hear some of those topics this month, and of course, some really great perspectives on how people are even defining leadership, which I think is extremely exciting. So sit back and enjoy this special episode of the I AM CEO podcast.

Hello. Hello. Hello. This is Gresh from the I AM CEO podcast, and I have a very special guest on the show today. I have Dr. Jerrica Dodd of Your Pharmacy Advocate, LLC. Dr. Jerrica, it's awesome to have you on the show.

Dr. Jerrica Dodd 02:01

Thank you. Thank you for having me today.

Gresham Harkless 02:03

No problem. Super excited to have you on. What I wanted to do was just read a little bit more about Dr Jerrica so you can hear about all the awesome things that she's doing. Dr. Jerrica is a pharmacist, entrepreneur, coach and leader. She holds a Doctor of Pharmacy Degree from the Florida Agriculture and Mechanical University. A Masters of Science in Pharmacy Administration and pharmacy residency from the Ohio State University and a Master of Science with a focus in Applied Pharmacoeconomics from the University of Florida.

Dr. Dodd has been a pharmacist for 21 years and transitioned into full-time entrepreneurship after a 17-year career in the pharmaceutical industry and multiple roles in medical affairs. Currently, she is enrolled in the Institute of Functional Medicine and aiming to introduce a functional medicine perspective to the pharmaceutical management of member patients of Your Pharma Advocate LLC. where she is the founder and CEO.

Dr. Dodd has been requested to serve as a speaker for numerous and diverse professional and community events with her background in pharmacy, leadership training and her passion for people. She enjoys encouraging people to be their best and to get the most out of every opportunity that life presents. Her favorite scripture is Luke 12:48 To whom much is given, much is required. Dr. Dodd endeavors to live life, giving back from the abundant ways in which she has been blessed.

Dr. Dodd, thank you so much for being on the show. Are you ready to speak to the I AM CEO community?

Dr. Jerrica Dodd 03:18

I am ready. Thank you.

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Gresham Harkless 03:20

No problem. Thank you for rocking and rolling. I wanted to kick everything off to hear a little bit more about what I call your CEO story and what led you to get started with your business.

Dr. Jerrica Dodd 03:27

Sure. My CEO story actually is more of a personal story. I don't know that I set out to be the CEO of a pharmacy consulting practice. But several years ago, probably about four years ago in 2015, I had the circumstances of Following and supporting my father as he was diagnosed with stage four lymphoma. He's a Vietnam vet. And then also five months later, supporting my mother through a triple bypass heart surgery in which she came out of that surgery with a dementia that lasted or what seemed like a dementia that lasted for about two years.

Five months after my mother's surgery, I had a brain surgery. So I found that along that journey, everything happened five months apart for each one of us. However, I was an advocate for my parents and also was an advocate for myself when I was in the hospital recovering.

In that time decided that I was going to definitely build something to help advocate for patients as they were on their health journeys because I realized how many questions people have about their health and don't have anyone to support them to get the answers they need.

Gresham Harkless 04:38

Absolutely. I'm definitely obviously sorry to hear all of that happened, especially in such a short period of time. But I appreciate you for not only helping yourself, helping your family, but also sounds like reaching out to help so many other people.

Dr. Jerrica Dodd 04:48

Yeah.

Gresham Harkless 04:49

So I wanted to drill down a little bit deeper. I know that, when those times happen, they're never really always usually expected. So you need to have people to lean on. I know you touched a little bit upon it, but can you tell us a little bit more on what you're doing with your clients?

Dr. Jerrica Dodd 05:02

Sure, so as I said, as I was recovering, I decided that I was going to build a business that could help patients by advocating for their health journey. I've built Your Pharmacy Advocate, which is a virtual pharmacy consulting practice where essentially every patient has their own personal pharmacist. So on average, when a patient goes to a physician's office, they get about 7 to 10 minutes in the exam room. That's not a long time to talk about your health history or what's ailing you at the moment.

So when that patient then leaves that office and then heads to their local pharmacy to pick up their prescription, generally they're tired, they've encountered the health care system, they're ready to get home, ready to get kids home, what have you. So there's usually not the pressing need to ask a lot of questions at that moment because that's just not usually where their focus is. And given the circumstances in two days, pharmacy profession, that pharmacist likely may or may not have the time to spend a lot of time with that patient answering their questions.

So Your Pharmacy Advocate fills that gap so that a patient can have a personal pharmacist that's assigned to them that knows their health and that can be available to answer their questions. Maybe it's at 7 p.m. When they get home and they've had a chance to download from the day and they have additional questions that they couldn't even think of in the doctor's office or at the pharmacy counter.

Gresham Harkless 06:25

Yeah, that makes perfect sense. You're not thinking about questions because pretty much you get your prescription. It's like you have any questions and no, you don't really have any questions because you never really thought about it.

But when you get back home in your safe space, you might have certain things you want to ask and to be able to tap into expertise, but also people that know you is definitely huge.

Dr. Jerrica Dodd 06:42

Sometimes you even just want more privacy. You don't necessarily want to ask all of your questions with a line of people who are waiting to pick up their prescription and you may feel like you're rushed or like you're in a hurry.

So those are also factors that weighed into the way that I designed this program.

Gresham Harkless 06:59

Yeah, that makes perfect sense. So you understand the frustrations, the standing in line and not wanting to ask certain questions, but all those things that are going through people's minds, you actually build your company around.

Dr. Jerrica Dodd 07:09

Right, some of the other things that caused me to build the platform the way that I did is that oftentimes patients are seeing multiple physicians. So while that challenge somewhat helped with the fact that we have electronic medical records, oftentimes patients have prescriptions from several doctors if they go to several different pharmacies potentially because maybe they are looking for better deals for their prescriptions.

So if you have multiple meds from multiple doctors and potentially coming from multiple pharmacies, who is able to keep track of all of that and make sure that one ultimately the patient is number one and safe? Who is able to help that patient communicate about those prescriptions and about any side effects or adverse events there have having as a result?

The pharmacist with Your Pharmacy Advocate are able to do that. We're also able to help patients to have communication with their doctors. Many patients won't call back and say this caused me to have a headache or this upset my stomach. They'll just think I don't want to bother the doctor. The pharmacist that they work with is able to either coach them on what to say and how to say it. Or we can interact with the healthcare practitioner directly on their behalf.

Gresham Harkless 08:23

Nice. You might have already touched on this, but could you talk a little bit more about it could be your personal secret sauce or your secret sauce for your organization or your company and what you feel sets you guys apart.

Dr. Jerrica Dodd 08:32

So what sets Your Pharmacy Advocate apart are a couple of different things. Number one, we're virtual and so we're able to reach patients where they are. We're able to communicate with them either by phone call or by a virtual meeting. All that can be done through either a website or an app on their phone or their tablet. So that makes it easy for the patient to basically literally have that pharmacist in the palm of their hand if that's convenient for them. It also allows us to dig a little deeper and we are able to spend time because we dig deeper.

We spend time with patients, not that 7 to 10 minutes we spend time asking questions and you would be amazed some of the times when we're talking with patients and you just ask the question, Is there anything else? And they go, Oh, yeah, I forgot to tell you this. So it really gives them a chance to answer the questions that help the pharmacist know more about their health. Then another secret sauce, if you will ingredient is that we take care of patients from a functional medicine standpoint. So we help ask the questions. Why? Why do you have hypertension? Why do you have diabetes? Why?

Oftentimes in conventional medicine, patients are given a prescription because of the symptoms that they're experiencing. But we're not really getting to the root of the problem. And so we aim to have those conversations and introduce that perspective into caring for that patient. We also serve as a team member to be an advocate not only for the patient, but also to support that patient's physician and having a pharmacist on their team, if you will.

Gresham Harkless 10:11

Nice. That makes perfect sense. And so that is what functional medicine is being able to function in society and on a regular basis. Is that the correct way to phrase it?

Dr. Jerrica Dodd 10:19

Functional medicine is a discipline of medicine to get to the root cause of our problems. So, for example, many of the chronic conditions, and this is a very high-level generalization description, but many of the chronic illnesses or chronic conditions that we experience or that people experience diabetes, hypertension, immune disorders such as multiple sclerosis, lupus. Chronic conditions such as those are really the result of our bodies saying there's something going on and the immune system is not reacting well to it. Or there's a considerable amount of underlying inflammation in the body. So there are medications that you can give.

However, if they are not getting to the root cause of what that inflammation is, it's almost trying to smolder or put something over a fire and it's still smoldering underneath. You've got to get to the root cause of what is keeping this fire going.

Gresham Harkless 11:16

Yeah, that makes perfect sense. So a lot of times I know people deal with a lot of stress, so sometimes they'll have pain in certain parts of their body or they have a headache and they think, okay, let me take this Advil. But in reality, if you're stressed, that's really the underlying cause you've got to figure out what that is.

Dr. Jerrica Dodd 11:29

Absolutely. Yes.

Gresham Harkless 11:30

I wanted to switch gears a little bit and ask you for what I call a CEO hack. This could be an app, a book or a habit that you have, but it's something that makes you more effective and efficient.

Dr. Jerrica Dodd 11:39

So. I would say, especially when I was newer in this journey, the book that was recommended to me was called The No B. S. Guide to Time Management for Entrepreneurs. It's by Dan Kennedy and there's a portion in the beginning of that book where he talks about how to value your time. What is your time worth?

I think sometimes when you begin the journey of CEO, you have goodwill and you want to spend time and talk to everybody that wants to talk with you. But going through that Portion of the book, working through the example and he even says in the book, don't get caught up, but basically don't get caught up in all of the details, but basically as best you can estimate what your time is worth. He gives a formula for that.

It helped me really see how to structure my calendar. What appointments to say yes to, what appointments to say yes for an hour versus yes for 20 minutes. So that is probably one of the biggest helps that I had as a new entrepreneur.

Gresham Harkless 12:43

Yeah, that makes perfect sense. Now I wanted to ask you for what I call a CEO nugget. This is a word of wisdom or a piece of advice or if you can hop into a time machine, what would you tell your younger business self?

Dr. Jerrica Dodd 12:53

Oh gosh, what I would tell my younger business self is that every day is not an up day, as I would say, the CEO. And so oftentimes when I began this journey, I thought it's just going to be peaches and cream. But that is not the case. What I've learned is that when it's not an up day, when it appears that a day is going to be a rough day or extremely difficult day, that number one, it will pass. It's not going to last forever. And two, it's very easy to we humans don't like to get out from under anything that makes us uncomfortable.

But that takes a lot of energy if we're flailing about and going, Oh, I don't like this. I don't like how this feels. But I've learned to understand that because this will pass, I'm able to say I don't really like how this is going. I don't like how this feels. However, it won't last forever and that takes less energy. I'm expending less energy trying to avoid the negative feelings or the down day, if you will, versus just breathing, walking through it and knowing that this to shall pass.

Gresham Harkless 14:02

Exactly. Now I wanted to ask you my absolute favorite question, which is the definition of what it means to be a CEO. We're hoping to have different quote and quote CEOs on the show.

So, Dr. Dodd, what does being a CEO mean to you?

Dr. Jerrica Dodd 14:11

Being a CEO to me means that I, one get to lead. I get to lead other patients. I get to lead other business owners, other pharmacists. it's a great responsibility, but it's also one of the most rewarding responsibilities because I get to design and lead my perspective on how patients should be taken care of and how their health should be cared for.

So, while it's one of the greatest responsibilities, it's also one of the greatest privileges that I've ever had.

Gresham Harkless 14:45I

appreciate that, appreciate your time, appreciate all the awesome things you're doing. What I wanted to do was ask you if there's anything additional you want to let our readers and listeners know.

And then, of course, how best they can get ahold of you to find out about everything you're doing.

Dr. Jerrica Dodd 14:55

Sure. So the last parting thought I'll leave, and this is really something that I learned along my journey with my parents and then my own health is that I am very passionate that it is important to be the CEO since we're talking about CEOs, it's important to be the CEO of your health. Your health is not the responsibility of your spouse, your adult children, or even your doctor for that, in that regard your health is your responsibility. So I'd like to encourage everyone to be the CEO of their health.

Then the way to stay connected or to connect and follow me is the website for your pharmacy advocate is yourpharmacyadvocate.com. There's a contact page there that you can fill out that contact information and I'm able to get that and follow up or on social media.

Your Pharmacy Advocate has a page on Facebook. There is an account on Instagram and then there's also LinkedIn. So again, Your Pharmacy Advocate is on social media at Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn.

Gresham Harkless 16:00

Absolutely. Thank you so much. We'll make sure to have those links and then show notes. Definitely thank you for the reminder as well that our health is our greatest wealth. So we have to make sure that we are the CEO of that so that we can have the best life that we can have in the most wealth that we are able to achieve.

So I truly appreciate your time, Dr. Dodd again, and I hope you have a phenomenal rest of the day.

Outro 16:18

Thank you for listening to the I AM CEO podcast powered by Blue 16 Media. Tune in next time and visit us at iamceo.co. I AM CEO is not just a phrase, it's a community. Be sure to follow us on social media and subscribe to our podcast on iTunes, Google Play, and everywhere you listen to podcasts.

Subscribe and leave us a five-star rating. Grab CEO gear at www.ceogear.co. This has been the I AM CEO podcast with Gresham Harkless. Thank you for listening.

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