Title: Transforming Healthcare Environments: Introducing Safe Space Made Simple (#001)
[00:00:00] Welcome to Safe Space Made Simple, a practical podcast that guides clinical leaders and healthcare managers to create trust and support with their teams. I'm your host, Trace Hobson. Join me for weekly interviews, practical tools, and inspiring transformational stories of bringing people together in healthcare.
[00:00:22] Now, let's dive in. Hey everybody, welcome to the first episode of Safe Space Made Simple, the podcast that I created for healthcare managers and clinical leaders that work every day in high pressure, high stress environments. I'm your host, Trace Hobson, and I'm so grateful that you're here listening to this first episode that describes what this podcast is about, where it comes from, and the real why that underlies it.
[00:00:50] Also, I want to just give you a tip that if you stay until the end of the podcast, there's a resource that I've created for you called the Safe Space Checklist. This is a really helpful resource that [00:01:00] you can download, print off, and begin to use to assess what the real level of safe space is for you as well as for your team.
[00:01:09] You know, I've worked in high pressure, high stress environments, my entire life, and there's lots of reasons for that, that I share in the origin story trailer that's a part of this podcast, so I'm not going to go into those now, but what I will say is that this has been sort of the tone of my entire life, the work I've done as a project manager, an executive leader, A coach has been in industries where urgency and high stress, high pressure is just the way that it is.
[00:01:40] Now, I thought that I had seen it all in my 20 plus year career as a, as a manager, a leader and a coach in high pressure situations and settings. Until I transitioned into health care several years ago and realized that people that are working in health care are experiencing [00:02:00] stress and pressure systemically on a whole other level.
[00:02:03] Now, as I started to work with practitioners, managers and leaders in different countries in health care, I noticed that there were these six health care system challenges that were coming up again and again. Number one was this this big gap between leaders and their teams that is really common, and this is one that I'm familiar with in my in my background and in my time as a manager and leader as well, because oftentimes I was leading teams in remote settings and would be responsible for, um, 50, 60, hundreds of employees on projects that were incredibly complex and difficult that were all located in different geographical areas.
[00:02:47] Um, So I noticed that that was quite common in health care, that either a manager or a leader had such a high head count that they just couldn't possibly have relationships with everybody, or they were located in different [00:03:00] areas in different settings and didn't have the chance to sort of be in the same room together.
[00:03:07] I've also experienced a generational gap that exists between old school and new school practitioners, where in the old school definition of things, it's just, you know, you got to just suck it up, do your job. This is just the way that health care is. It doesn't matter if, uh, you know, it doesn't feel safe for you.
[00:03:25] It doesn't matter whether or not you're tired. You just literally need to keep going and suck it up. Whereas on the other side of that table in the new school approach, it's the complete opposite. Professionalism is defined as being able to choose to create safe situations for themselves. And if it doesn't feel safe, then they don't want to do it.
[00:03:45] Sucking it up doesn't feel professional to them. It feels unsafe. And so there's this clash that happens between those two generations. The other gap that I noticed is that oftentimes there's this constant [00:04:00] struggle to try and close the gap between where the leader is and where they want to be and where their team is and where they want their team to be.
[00:04:08] And this is like a constant conversation they're having every single day. So this leadership gap was the first. Healthcare system challenge that I noticed the next one that I that I really saw over and over again is this systemic distress, cumulative stress and burnout that comes from what I would call unresolved systemic trauma.
[00:04:29] That's that's happening over and over again. In fact, what I notice is that In healthcare, there is a culture of urgency and this fight, flight, freeze, and faint culture where it's become normalized for the nervous systems that we have as human beings to be triggered all day long, and that's just become accepted and normal so much so that we don't even oftentimes notice it.
[00:04:55] The third big healthcare system challenge is disrespectful conduct, [00:05:00] communication, conflict, and interactions that include things like gossip, uh, harassment, discrimination, discriminatory harassment, and even bullying. Now this can be very subtle or very egregious. It just depends. But it's this, there's this tone that often exists in relationships between team members and between teams, uh, departments and units, where there's this sense of an underlying disrespectful tone that's there that nobody seems to know how to actually change, you know, investigation doesn't do it.
[00:05:34] Um, gradual discipline doesn't change it. And so it's a systemic challenge that keeps coming up over and over again. Now, the fourth healthcare system challenge that I notice is this constant tone of being reactive, resistant, or reclusive. And people are not sure how to respond in a way that serves them and serves other people.
[00:05:56] And this is connected to the first three challenges, obviously, but [00:06:00] this is a constant theme that comes up again and again. And it becomes acceptable. That's just the way healthcare is. This is just the way it is. As you look at these first four big system challenges, that leads into number five, which is there's a lack of sustainable, practical and operational plans for self care, well being and work life balance.
[00:06:21] You know, there's lots of talk within health care about well being taking care of yourself, making sure that you do that so that you can be there for other people. But there's actually You know, in practice, a culture of sacrificing yourself so that you can get your job done and there's no operationalized plan for how to actually do well being self care and even psychological safety in the day to day of your work.
[00:06:50] So when I talk to leaders and managers, they often tell me, you know, it's, it's all fine and well to talk about this, but how do we actually do it? And then the last challenge that all of this [00:07:00] leads into, of course, is a big problem with absenteeism and even an exodus that is happening in healthcare today, where people are experiencing all these challenges and they are opting out.
[00:07:12] And this is happening more and more in Canadian healthcare. And it's happening worldwide, which of course is driving. This big shortage of people that we have all over the world that are willing to work in this kind of an environment. I'm talking about absenteeism, stress leave and lost time injuries that keep going up, causing retention and recruitment to go down.
[00:07:35] So when I look at all that I've just shared, I've experienced exactly the same things in my career over the last 20 plus years. Now the reason I wanted to create this podcast is because I believe it's possible to flip the script that we normally have about work. Typically speaking in high pressure, high stress situations, you just give all that you can at work and you try to save a little bit [00:08:00] for the end of the day so that You can go and live the rest of your life.
[00:08:03] The problem with that is that in a setting like this, what happens is you go home exhausted, but you're also emotionally vacant as well. You can't actually muster anymore for the other things. I mean, it's barely. Possible to go into go grocery shopping and make dinner and but let alone taking care of the emotional needs of your life and your family, or, you know, the things you want to do in this in this world that there's just nothing left in the tank at the end of this kind of a work day now for me, what was so frustrating for so long in my career was that.
[00:08:38] It just didn't seem like there was any solution to this. This was just, you know, the way it was, which caused me such a, a huge amount of dissonance because the whole reason I went to work was, yeah, I want to, I wanna express my who I am, and I want to have a meaningful impact in the world. But even on a more basic level, I went to because I wanted to take care of my family and take care of my [00:09:00] life and be able to provide.
[00:09:02] You know, the very thing that I was doing every day, uh, to provide financially was actually sucking all of the life out of me and, and really creating a gap between me and the things that were most important to me. And so, you know, I struggled with this for years and years wondering what can I do differently?
[00:09:22] Well, what I discovered through a whole bunch of different sort of, um, serendipitous circumstances is that it is possible for work to be a support for the other areas of my life. But it happens in a completely counterintuitive way that I never expected. And, you know, I share my story about that in the, uh, the episode or the trailer that I created called my origin story, the origin story of where this work comes from.
[00:09:51] Where, where I'm coming from and also how I discovered that you can actually flip the script. So what do I mean by that? Well, it [00:10:00] is possible to go to work and to leave it all on the floor, so to speak, or to really give your all, but to do that in a way that is psychologically healthy and safe, neurobiologically safe, and also based on.
[00:10:16] Presence based technologies in leadership, management and coaching. And when you do that, you will go home tired at the end of the day. But the, but the interesting thing is that it also energizes you for the rest of your life. You're not leaving that emotional energy there. And when you get into the car to go home at the end of the day, you've got gas left in the tank to live your other lives or the other parts of your life.
[00:10:40] In fact, it actually energizes you because you leave. Inspired to be the best that you can be at home as well as at work. Now, the other big reason why I created this podcast relates to this, because I've talked to people in health care that are experiencing this [00:11:00] on a day to day basis. It doesn't, it's not happening a lot yet, but it is happening where people share that.
[00:11:06] Yeah, you know, I really love the team that I'm working on, and when I go home at the end of the day, I am tired. But the whole experience of having somebody walk with me, shoulder to shoulder, um, you know, doing meaningful work with people that I care about and that care about me, inspires me to live the rest of my life.
[00:11:25] So I wanted to create a platform where we could sort of raise the frequency and highlight stories in health care that are inspiring and that experience a safe space. And then what are the practical results of that? Well, I want to hear. Those practical results from people that are actually living it in their role and in their day to day.
[00:11:47] And so what better way than to bring them into the podcast and to interview them and hear their stories. And then what we want to do on the podcast is translate those stories and draw out those really [00:12:00] practical, actionable steps. That, that you can do in your team and especially in situations that are dealing with those six system challenges that I mentioned earlier, and we do that through cutting edge leadership technology that we have available to us and that's being shared in the world that moves away from the old command and control styles of leadership into something that's more compassionate and that nurtures our spirits.
[00:12:29] And that gets the work done in a completely new way. So I created this podcast to help healthcare managers, leaders and teams to learn how to create a safe space where people feel belonging, trust and support. And the natural result is healing relationship and joy at work and at home. I want this to be a platform that shares people's perspectives and stories, and that makes it a support system for people to be able to be [00:13:00] their best at work and at home simultaneously.
[00:13:03] So who am I? Who's Trace Hobson? Well, I'm not gonna go into deeper detail about that than I did in the Origin episode or. uh, trailer that I created for you. You can do a deep dive there. You can also check my LinkedIn profile where you can see my experience, where I'm coming from, and the kind of work that I've been doing over the last 15 years or so.
[00:13:23] As far as what you can expect from the show's format, there will be weekly episodes that will come out every Tuesday, and each episode will have guests that are like you or me working in healthcare right now in different roles that will be relevant to clinical leaders and managers. I'm also going to invite people to bring their stories that they have of what happened when they created a safe space.
[00:13:47] What does that mean? And also, what was their experience with that? I'll also invite thought leaders and authors that are on the cutting edge of transforming healthcare and leadership so that we can learn [00:14:00] from them together what it is that they're doing to change the system. And lastly, I'll also create episodes that will give you skills and tools that you can apply immediately in your day to day work and life.
[00:14:14] I'm also really excited to share that my friend and colleague, Carolyn Vierman, who works in healthcare in Holland, is going to be a periodic co host with me as well. So in future episodes, Carolyn and I will talk about what's working in Holland, what's working in Canada, and how those things might actually work.
[00:14:32] Be related and as we move forward and we get feedback from the audience will create resources that will serve and help you. My invitation to you is that if this resonates for you, if this sounds like a podcast that is going to be helpful for you and your work and even in your life that you hit subscribe and watch for future episodes that come out on Tuesdays.
[00:14:56] Our first official episode, episode number two [00:15:00] will come out on November 28th, 2023. Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. I appreciate you. As an expression of my gratitude and appreciation for the work that you're doing, I've created a downloadable resource for you that is a safe space checklist.
[00:15:17] This is a checklist that you can use that will give you an immediate win by increasing your awareness of where you and your team are at right now when it comes to creating a safe space to receive your safe space checklist, simply click the link in the show notes of this episode. And if you'd like to reach out with any questions, feel free to message me on LinkedIn.
[00:15:41] I hope you have a wonderful day and remember to be a safe space for yourself, the people around you. For your life.
