After nearly 22 years in dentistry, these are the lessons I would go back and tell the hygienist I was just starting out.
If I could go back and sit across from the version of myself who had just graduated from hygiene school, I’m not sure I would start by talking about instrumentation, ergonomics, perio protocols, or production.
I would tell her this instead: “Your career is going to become much bigger than you can see from where you are sitting right now.”
I’m going on 22 years in dentistry, and I’ve had a front-row seat to the profession changing again and again. I’ve worked clinically, practiced across multiple states, temped in more than 100 offices, built businesses, stepped onto stages, worked with companies, watched new technologies emerge, and created roles that didn’t exist when I graduated.
None of that was part of some perfectly mapped-out plan.
When I came out of hygiene school, I thought building a successful career meant becoming really good at the job in front of me: master the instruments, know the science, do not leave a single speck of calculus, ensure the patients know flossing includes a c-shape technique, find a good practice (with benefits), and work hard. Every one of those things has value, but what I couldn’t see then was how much permission we have to shape our own careers.
So if I could sit down with the brand-new hygienist I once was—or with the hygienist today who is wondering, Is this all there is? What else could I do? Where do I go from here?—these are the things I would tell them.
1. Trust Your Clinical Intuition
Every experienced clinician knows the feeling. A longtime patient sits down, you look in their mouth, and almost immediately you think, Something is different.
For years, we called that clinical instinct. What we were really developing was pattern recognition. The longer you practice, the more your brain begins connecting things before you consciously know why. Pay attention to that instinct. Then use imaging, diagnostics, saliva, AI, risk assessment, and emerging technologies to investigate what your clinical brain is noticing.
2. You Do Not Have to Stay Inside the Job Description You Were Handed
When I graduated, the career path for a hygienist felt much narrower. You practiced clinically, became an educator, or perhaps moved into sales.
Thanks to the pioneering hygienists who have gone before us, the map has exploded. Today, hygienists are founders, consultants, executives, speakers, writers, researchers, product developers, entrepreneurs, investors, educators, advocates, podcasters, and strategists.
Your hygiene license is no longer a ceiling; instead, it is a foundation. If the career you want doesn’t exist yet, don’t let that stop you. Find a way to create it.
3. Most People Are Figuring It Out as They Go
Early in your career, it is easy to assume everyone else has figured out something you haven’t.
Here’s the secret: they usually haven’t.
Some people are simply more comfortable moving before they know exactly how everything will turn out. Ask the question. Introduce yourself. Apply for the opportunity. Pitch the idea. Send the email. Countless moments in my career started because I simply asked. Never underestimate the power of asking.
4. Dentistry Looks Different Everywhere
During my first six years out of school, I held licenses in four different states. Looking back, that was one of the greatest educations I could have received. Dentistry looks different from state to state, coast to coast, and country to country. Scope of practice changes. Workflows change. Technology adoption changes. Patient expectations change.
One of the best things I have done is intentionally build relationships with colleagues outside my own geographic bubble. When we only talk to people who practice exactly like us, our version of dentistry starts to feel like the version of dentistry. It isn’t.
Get to know colleagues outside your state and outside your country. Ask how they practice and what they are doing differently. There are many ways to solve the same problem.
5. Surround Yourself With People Who Expand You
I started traveling for work in 2019 and went to my first dental conference. I was traveling alone and repeatedly walking into rooms where I didn’t know a soul.
It was scary. I had to put on a brave, bright face and act more comfortable than I felt.
Now, walking into a room where I don’t know anyone is one of my favorite things to do. I never know who I will form a working relationship with, build a close bond with, or simply become friends with.
My husband laughs that my work and social lives intertwine so much it is hard to know where one ends and the other begins. I wouldn’t change it for the world.
At some point, I also began intentionally surrounding myself with people I admired and people who thought the way I did. Once I found more like-minded people, I began to feel more whole—and doors started opening.
Your network matters, but more importantly, your circle matters. Surround yourself with people who make you want to become more of who you already are.
6. Spend Some Time Temping
I was reluctant to temp. Then I did it—and eventually worked in more than 100 dental practices across the country. It became one of the most valuable experiences of my career.
I remember walking into one office and immediately realizing something was off because nobody said hello. Once I found my room and got started, I realized the instruments, charting, and systems were subadequate. That day required an uncomfortable conversation with leadership, and those kinds of uncomfortable experiences helped shape me.
Then there were the complete opposites: practices where, halfway through the day, a manager or dentist would ask, “Can we hire you full-time?”
Temping taught me what great leadership looks like, what poor systems look like, realistically which technologies get used, and how radically culture can differ from one practice to another. It exposed me to new products, workflows, instruments, and ways of thinking.
You don’t have to temp full-time. Do it one day a month. Getting uncomfortable may teach you more about dentistry than staying comfortable ever will.
7. Hang Up a Beloved Instrument Once in a While
Hygienists become attached to our tools. I understand. You survived hygiene school together. But some of the tools and techniques we learned in school were simply the best options available at the time. That does not mean they should remain the best tools for the next 30 years.
Try the new instrument. Scan the patient. Learn the diagnostic. Test the technology. You do not need to adopt every shiny new object in dentistry. Skepticism is healthy.
8. Think in “Ownership”
Early in our careers, we often focus on compensation: hourly rate, benefits, schedule, production. Eventually I learned to ask different questions. Who owns what we are building? Who owns the intellectual property? Who owns the audience, the data, or the company? Who participates in the upside?
If your ideas, reputation, relationships, creativity, or expertise are helping create significant value, learn how business works. Understand contracts, equity, intellectual property, and compensation beyond your hourly rate.
Clinical professionals create enormous value. It’s up to us to understand where that value goes.
9. Make Time to Give Back
Volunteer clinically. Serve in a professional association. Help at your child’s school. Mentor a student. Coach a team. Get involved in your community.
Our enthusiasm for oral health travels further than we realize. A child may bring something you taught them home to their family. A student you mentor may eventually care for thousands of patients.
Our impact often reaches people we will never meet.
10. The Career You Are Trying to Plan Probably Doesn’t Exist Yet
Parts of my own career did not exist when I graduated. I was one of the early people bringing dental influencing into the professional side of dentistry, at a time when social media was not viewed as a serious professional platform. Later, I became the first Chief Hygiene Officer. There was no roadmap for that title either. Someone had to define it.
You define yourself. Do not let somebody else define you.
Just because a role doesn’t exist does not mean it can’t. Some of the most important jobs in dentistry ten years from now probably do not have titles yet.
Build the things that travel with you: curiosity, clinical credibility, communication skills, relationships, adaptability, business knowledge, and confidence.
11. You Don’t Have to Choose One Version of Yourself
You can be a clinician and an entrepreneur, a healthcare professional and a businessperson, a leader and a parent, ambitious and deeply invested in your family.
You can leave clinical practice and return to it. You can build something, close something, reinvent yourself, and change directions.
Your career will be hard. It will be fun. It will be equally fulfilling and exhausting.
Give yourself permission to define it, morph it, shape it, and reshape it. Your career belongs to you.
Bonus: We Don’t Know What We Don’t Know
Evidence-based dentistry has moved our profession forward tremendously, but evidence only reflects what we have been able to study, measure, and understand so far.
We are entering an extraordinary period of discovery around the oral microbiome, saliva, biomarkers, systemic connections, personalized risk, artificial intelligence, virtual care, and the biology of disease.
Some of what we learn will reinforce what we already believe. Some will challenge us. Some may reinvent the way we care for patients. Keep an open mind.
Nearly 22 years into this career, I am more curious about dentistry than I was when I started.
And if you are reading this while feeling restless in your own career, pay attention to that feeling. Restlessness does not always mean you need to leave dentistry. Sometimes it means you need a different version of dentistry.
Maybe you need a new clinical environment. Maybe you need to explore leadership, speaking, consulting, education, innovation, entrepreneurship, or a role that does not have a title yet. Maybe you simply need someone outside your immediate circle to help you see possibilities you cannot see from where you are standing.
That is part of why career coaching and mentoring have become increasingly important to me. I have spent years talking with clinicians who know they are capable of more but are not quite sure how to turn that feeling into direction.
Sometimes the answer is a major career shift. Sometimes it is one courageous conversation. Sometimes it is simply giving yourself permission to ask, What else is possible for me?
Stay curious. Try something new. Meet someone different from you. Question the way something has always been done. Ask why.
And when there is a door you want to walk through but you aren’t sure you are invited?
Simply ask.
About the Author
Melissa K. Turner, BASDH, RDHEP, EFDA, is a dental hygienist, executive, entrepreneur, speaker, strategist, and career coach who has spent nearly 22 years helping shape the future of dentistry. Her career has spanned clinical care, innovation, entrepreneurship, professional influence, consulting, and industry leadership. Through speaking, strategy, and coaching, she helps clinicians and dental professionals expand what they believe is possible for their careers and create paths that reflect who they want to become.
