Just because something feels tense doesn't mean you're dealing with true conflict. More often than not, it's something sneakier—unclear expectations, a broken system, or a values mismatch that’s been quietly brewing under the surface. If you’ve ever found yourself thinking “Why is this person being so difficult?”… this is for you.

Let’s be real: conflict doesn’t just feel hard—it feels like your entire nervous system wants to flip the table, crawl under it, or over-explain your way out of the conversation. If you’ve ever felt like you were crushing it one second and spiraling the next, you’re not broken. You’re just a human trying to navigate a tough conversation without losing your grounding.

Hard conversations suck. They just do. They're awkward, emotionally loaded, and personal in all the worst (and most important) ways. If you're in any kind of leadership or ownership role, you’ve either delayed one, over-explained one, or completely bailed on one. This guide is for the moments when you know you’ve got to say something, but the words just aren’t coming. Let’s fix that.

Conflict. It’s gonna happen. Whether it’s a passive-aggressive email, a team member with a grudge, or someone constantly stirring the damn pot, conflict is just part of running a group practice.

But here’s the deal—conflict itself isn’t the problem. Bad leadership is.

If you’re a practice owner drowning in hiring struggles, retention headaches, and why-the-hell-is-everyone-doing-their-own-thing moments, this is your space. I’m here to talk about the stuff no one tells you when you start this whole practice ownership gig–and, more importantly, how to get it right.

Let me take you back to a day that started like any other. The birds were chirping, the coffee was brewing, the Taylor Swift album was playing in the background as I was getting into my emails, and I was gungho to tackle a busy day.

Cut to mid-morning when I walked into the break room. BOOM. A full-on passive-aggressive explosion between two of my team members over something as monumental as… a lost stapler (not legit, but close enough).