Control vs. Empowerment: What Actually Builds a High-Performing Dental Team?

Every leader running more than one location eventually asks the same question: do you hold on tighter or let go? That's the debate at the center of the most recent episode of Dinosaurs vs. Disruptors, where host Dr. Ryan Hungate and Zach Shelley, President of Zero Dental Billing, argued opposite sides of control versus empowerment, before handing the verdict to Evelyn Lahiji, COO of Children's Dental Fun Zone. 

Is a controlling leader a dinosaur, or the last line of defense? 

Hungate, arguing for control, pointed to what he calls "benevolent dictators," leaders in the DSO space who give the appearance of choice while keeping real decision-making authority close. His concern with empowerment: hand off too much control too early, and vision starts to slip. He argued that authority isn't a personality flaw, it's a structural choice. 

Is empowerment just abdication with better branding? 

Shelley pushed back hard on one specific point: empowerment is not free reign. His argument was that structure and standards can coexist with autonomy, and that leaders who put too much control on every decision end up boxing team members into one rigid way of doing things, even when different people learn and work differently. His sharpest line of the episode: authority applied without genuine trust isn't leadership, it's "pixie dust" over the same old command and control. 

What is the right balance between control and empowerment in dental leadership? 

Evelyn didn't split the difference evenly. Her framework: 80% empowerment, 20% control. That ratio comes directly from running more than 20 locations, over 600 staff members, and roughly 35,000 patient visits a month, a scale where total control simply isn't operationally possible, but total hands-off delegation isn't safe either. 

Her version of the 20%: trust, but verify. Regional managers are expected to make real decisions and bring solutions, not just problems, but she checks in weekly or monthly to make sure standards are holding. Skip that verification step, she argued, and you're not empowering someone, you're handing your culture to someone else to rebuild in their own image. 

What does real empowerment look like in a multi-location dental practice? 

Evelyn drew a clear line between real empowerment and what she called "fake empowerment," a kind of inception where a leader says the word without meaning it. Real empowerment, in her practice, looks like giving people small wins first, direct and immediate feedback when something goes wrong, and a visible ladder for anyone who wants to grow. Fake empowerment is telling someone they have a voice and then not actually listening when they use it. 

How does technology change the control versus empowerment equation? 

Both hosts pointed to a shift already underway: AI tools that flag issues or push back on decisions in real time, functioning less like software and more like a 24/7 coach. Evelyn's take was that the right technology doesn't replace the human balance between control and empowerment; it just makes the 20% easier to execute without becoming a full-time monitoring job. 

The takeaway 

Neither side of this debate walked away with a clean win, and that's largely the point. Evelyn's 80/20 framework suggests the real skill in dental leadership isn't picking control or empowerment, it's knowing which 20% actually needs your hands on it. 

Listen to the full debate on Dinosaurs vs. Disruptors, a Henry Schein One podcast, available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you listen.