Nobody hands you a manual for your first 90 days.
Here's the one I give the new grads I mentor.

Ask before you're drowning, not after.

The best time to ask for help is the moment you notice you're unsure, not three rooms later. Nobody experienced thinks less of a new doctor for asking — they worry about the one who never does. Try: "Can I run this one by you for two minutes before I talk to the owner?"

You're not expected to do this by yourself. You'll get more proficient, and learn more, with help than without it. Lean on your mentor, your techs, the doctor in the next room. That's what they're there for.

Finish your notes before you leave.

Records that go home with you turn a ten-hour day into a thirteen-hour one, quietly, every day. Write as you go, keep templates for your common visits, and treat "notes done" as part of the appointment, not homework.

One thing that changed this for me: I teach new grads how to use AI in their record keeping, and it has saved me hours on my own records. If you'd like to learn how, it's part of my mentorship.

Protect one boundary in your schedule. Just one, to start.

This is the one almost nobody follows. Pick a single thing — a real lunch, leaving within 30 minutes of your last appointment, longer slots for your first sick visits — and ask for it early, while you're new and it reads as a reasonable request, not a complaint. Try: "For my first couple of months, could my sick appointments be booked at 30 minutes? I want to make sure I have enough time to be thorough for each client."

Learn one or two new skills a week — then go looking for reps.

A nerve block, an ultrasound-guided cysto, a cleaner discharge conversation. Tell your mentor or lead tech what this week's skills are so they can pull you in when the case comes up.

Then spend the rest of the week hunting for chances to practice them. Ask to do the next one, offer to help on a colleague's case, volunteer when it comes up on the schedule. A skill you've done three or four times in a week stays with you when next week's new skill arrives. A skill you did once is gone by Friday.

Advocate for yourself in the room.

If you need a tech, more time, or a second opinion, say so plainly. That isn't being difficult; it's being a doctor.

And when you don't know something, say so. Try: "Honestly, I'm not sure — that's a great question. Let me look it up and get you the right answer." Owners respect that far more than a confident guess or an unsure answer. The habits you build in your first 90 days are the ones you'll still have in year five.

☐ Know where everything lives: crash cart, controlled drugs, the forms you'll fill out daily.
☐ Learn every tech's and receptionist's name in week one. They will save you more than anyone.
☐ Find out who you call when you're stuck, and how — text or walk over.
☐ Start a log of every helpful thing someone tells you: drug doses, how to word a hard conversation, the steps of a skill, a trick for a difficult patient.
☐ Build templates for your five most common visits.
☐ Pick your one schedule boundary (rule three) and ask for it.

☐ Notes done before you leave, at least four days out of five.
☐ Name your skills of the week every Monday, out loud, to someone — and find at least two chances to practice each.
☐ Once a week, ask your mentor: "Where do you think I can improve, and what should I be working on?"
☐ Tell your mentor what you need from them, too — more cases or fewer, more support on dentistry and less on appointments, whatever is true that week.
☐ Keep adding to your log. Read it back on a slow afternoon.
☐ Eat something between 11 and 2. Seriously.

☐ Ask for a 90-day check-in with your medical director: what's going well, what you want more of.
☐ Look back at your skills list and pick the next ones.
☐ Decide whether to keep your boundary as it is or add a second one.
☐ Put one thing outside medicine on your calendar every week and treat it like an appointment.
☐ Write down what surprised you. Your future mentee will want it.