The PEA-SimpliMD Digest: This Week in Micro-Business — Week of May 11–17, 2026

The PEA-SimpliMD Digest: This Week in Micro-Business — Week of May 11–17, 2026

From Dr. Tod

There are weeks where each post lands independently — a good read, a useful tip, something to think about. And then there are weeks where, when you lay all three posts side by side, a single through-line appears that you didn't fully plan but can't ignore once you see it.

This was one of those weeks.

Monday started with a real conversation — me and Dr. Olga Deengar on her podcast, talking about what it actually looks like when a physician reads a book and then goes and builds something with it. Wednesday went inside a negotiation where a doctor used a spreadsheet to turn a W-2 transition into a six-figure tax restructuring. And Friday brought it all back to the ground level: what does it take to manage this kind of business week to week without it swallowing your life?

All three posts, different angles. Same answer underneath: ownership is not a destination. It's a practice. You do it in conversations, in spreadsheets, in the one hour a week you carve out for your business. You do it by deciding, repeatedly, that your professional life belongs to you.

That's what this week was about. I hope one of these posts finds you where you need it.

This Week's Quote

"A spreadsheet doesn't negotiate — but when the numbers are right, it does all the persuading for you. Build the case. Show the math. Let the data carry the argument you can't make with words alone."

— Dr. Tod Stillson

This Week's Posts

Monday — The Entrepreneur's Life

She Read My Book Three Times. Then She Built Her Life Around What It Said.

Dr. Olga Deengar is a hospitalist living in Toronto with three children under six. She does locum work, batches her Florida shifts around her family's summer, and coaches other physicians through her own practice. She read Doctor Incorporated three times — once to open her eyes, once to underline, once to build her plan.

What she built is a professional life that bends around her family instead of the other way around. In our conversation we talked about the slow erosion of professional identity that happens inside large employment systems, what it feels like to reclaim it, and how the ownership mindset changed not just her finances but how she shows up as a physician, a parent, and a coach.

If you have ever looked at your career and quietly wondered whether it has to be this way — this post is for you.

Wednesday — Think Like an Owner-Entrepreneur

The $30,000 Spreadsheet: How an Owner Mindset Turned a Part-Time Gig Into a Tax Win

A pediatric intensivist was transitioning from a full-time role in Wisconsin to a new position in Ohio. His old hospital wanted him to keep covering one week a month. They offered to continue his W-2 employment, cover his malpractice, pay his travel. He said no — then showed them a better deal.

The spreadsheet he built demonstrated that converting the arrangement to a 1099 contract would save the hospital over $30,000. The hospital agreed. And on his end, that income now flows through his professional corporation — with full deduction access, retirement contribution room, and S-Corp distribution flexibility that didn't exist when he was a W-2 employee.

This post breaks down the owner mindset behind that move and what it looks like when you negotiate from data rather than from hope.

Friday — Micro-Business Tips for Clinicians (skip the MBA)

How to Run Your Single-Member Micro-Corporation Without It Running You

The most common fear I hear from physicians considering a micro-corporation is this: "I already have no free time." Fair. So this week's Friday post addressed it directly — five practical strategies for running a solo PC in a few hours a month once the infrastructure is in place.

Self-management, family employment, stacking income channels, outsourcing non-core functions, and connecting your business to a real wealth plan. All five covered with concrete specifics, including a case study of Dr. Abramowitz — a hospitalist who contributes $46,000 annually to her solo 401(k) while spending less than an hour a week on business administration.

If you've been putting off forming a micro-corp because it sounds like one more thing to manage, this post will change that math for you.

Tool of the Week

Free eBook — PEA Explorer and above

Mastering Bookkeeping for Your Micro-Corporation

This week's posts covered ownership mindset, income restructuring, and day-to-day micro-corp management. The one thing that ties all three together in practice is clean financial records. Without them, your CPA can't optimize your taxes, your retirement contributions get missed, and the whole system leaks.

This free guide walks you through exactly what a solo physician owner needs to track, how to organize it monthly, and what to hand off so nothing falls through at year end. Grab it here— free for Explorer members and above.

Affiliate Highlight

Tax and Accounting — DocWealth

This week's Wednesday and Friday posts both pointed toward the same practical need: a CPA who actually understands how physician micro-corporations work. Not a general practitioner who will figure it out on your dime. Someone who has done this before, knows the S-Corp salary conversation, and can help you structure fringe benefits, retirement contributions, and distributions correctly from day one.

DocWealth is the firm I refer physicians to when this need comes up. They specialize in physician-owned entities and know the specific tax terrain you're operating in. Tell them SimpliMD sent you.

Free eBook This Week

Should I Create a Professional Micro-Corporation? (free)

If this week's posts landed and you found yourself thinking "I need to figure out if this actually applies to me" — this is the right starting point. It walks through the specific criteria that make a micro-corp financially viable for an attending physician, what the formation process looks like, and how to assess whether the structure fits your current situation. Free for PEA Explorer members and above.

PEA Membership

The Physician Entrepreneur Academy is where physician entrepreneurs at every stage get the education, tools, and community to build and manage their micro-corporation with confidence. Three membership tiers, one community.

Explorer

$99/yr

Blog access, free eBooks, community. The right starting point.

Builder

$499/yr

Full resource library, templates, and deeper tools for active micro-corp owners.

Pro

$999/yr

Everything in Builder plus premium courses and priority access to coaching.

Join the community at simplimd.com/PEAMembership.

Book a $500 Business Strategy Session

Until Next Week

Three posts this week. One theme underneath all of them: your professional life is yours to design, but only if you decide to treat it that way. Dr. Olga did. The pediatric intensivist with the spreadsheet did. Dr. Abramowitz did. None of them had special advantages. They had information, a structure, and the willingness to act on it.

That's what we're building here together — physicians who own their careers, retain more of what they earn, and show up to clinical work from a place of choice rather than dependency.

If this week's posts moved something for you, forward this digest to one colleague who needs to see it. The community grows one physician at a time, and the next person who needs this might be sitting right next to you.

See you Monday.

— Dr. Tod