Life & Work with Tiffany Goss of Overland Park

Today we’d like to introduce you to Tiffany Goss.

Hi Tiffany, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, let’s briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today.
In July 2019, my brother-in-law, Chris Surek, DO, FACS, started the Academy for Injection Anatomy, a unique anatomy/hands-on cadaver course that teaches cross-sectional anatomy for the aesthetic injector. He recognized that there was a thirst for knowledge within the industry, so he developed the educational content and recruited some of the most distinguished and experienced injectors to serve as faculty, and it took off from there. We worked with and continue to work with Meri Genesis, “a medical research institution that facilitates state-of-the-art, hands-on educational courses for physicians, nurses, and other medical professionals from across the country and around the world,” who come in, set up the lab and bring in cadaver specimens. During the lab, attendees perform 10 injections and 10 dissections using an orange- and green-dyed filler product. Once they dissect down after injecting, it allows them to visualize within the vessels to see if they injected in the correct plane. Our course is unique in how it is taught, through cross-sectional anatomy and the intimacy of the overall hands-on experience. Before Dr. Surek brought me on board, he was handling everything from registration, hotel contracts, flight and transportation arrangements for attendees, marketing, and lab setup, all while teaching it, running his private practice in plastic surgery, and taking care of the family, so it didn’t take long for him to realize he needed help. He hired me for operations, and the rest is history. We built the course alongside our faculty and grew organically by word of mouth. We created an Instagram account and accumulated over 15,000 followers within the first two years.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall, and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
We had a waitlist of more than 600, but COVID hit, and we had to pivot. The longevity of the course was unknown—we truly had no idea if we would be able to push through, but we were determined. We thought, “What better way to continue to educate during such a critical time than by creating a virtual platform that our users could access from the comfort of their own homes when the rest of the world was shut down?” We created the AIA Virtual Anatomy Lecture Series, an over-the-shoulder “deep dive through 3-D facial anatomy. An accumulation of over a decade of facial anatomy research and discovery by Dr. Surek.” This also allowed us to establish continuing medical education (CME) that our attendees could claim upon course completion.

Once the world slowly started to open back up and we grew accustomed to our new normal, we began holding our courses at the Crossroads Hotel, located in the heart of downtown Kansas City. We quickly came to find that allying with them and their team would be a benefit to all of us, as they offered a space to hold our events, and we compensated them from a financial standpoint when local businesses took a fall when COVID hit. Fast forward to January 2021—we had 18 courses under our belt, and we were ready to take it to the next level. Unfortunately, we didn’t have the resources to scale it and reach a larger audience, so we partnered with the American Med Spa Association (AmSpa), an organization based in Chicago focused primarily on providing business, legal, and compliance information for medical spa owners and operators. AmSpa wanted to expand into clinical training, so this partnership was a perfect fit. It was then that we set out on a national tour with the AmSpa team and took our course on the road.

Thanks for sharing that. So, you could tell us a bit more about your work.
Academy for Injection Anatomy Training Coordinator American Med Spa Association (AmSpa).

What has been the most important lesson you’ve learned along your journey?
It has been almost three years since AmSpa hired me as its AIA training coordinator. I often find myself looking back on how complex the integration process was—the moments where I thought I couldn’t handle the drawbacks and relinquishing control, as I was accustomed to doing everything on my own, to handing over what felt like my baby that I raised and nurtured into the hands of people I didn’t know. Here I am, present day, and I couldn’t be more grateful that I made it through and am a part of such an incredible, passionate group of people who have grown to love AIA as much as Dr. Surek, our faculty, and I do. I am very blessed that I have the ability within my role at AmSpa to continue maintaining many of the responsibilities I had before the acquisition, such as communicating directly with our attendees, working closely with our faculty and handling their travel accommodations, setting up the cadaver lab with Meri Genesis, and dying the syringes used to inject the dyed product. Those are just some of my favorites, but I never did think I’d grow so exponentially within my role that I am now leading the company through the CME and grant processes. It’s a huge feat for me, and I am very excited for my future with the company and the future of AIA! We have held 55 courses, taught 2,886 injectors, and performed 506 dissections, and those numbers continue to climb!

I want to give a special thanks to my brother-in-law, Academy for Injection Anatomy partner and mentor, Dr. Chris Surek. I would not be where I am today without your constant support and guidance, even through the most challenging of times. The respect I have for you is immense. For everything that you do for me, our family and your passion in the Plastics/and Medical Aesthetics Industry. Your ability to remain humble no matter the growth of your successes is truly admirable.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://americanmedspa.org/aiaadvanced
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tiffanygoss_/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/goss.tiffany/