SixSEED Partners

Petra Platzer

SSP’s CEO Succession Story – Part I:

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Reflecting

November 28, 2023

As of November 30, 2023 – Joy Goldman is resigning as CEO of SixSEED Partners while continuing to serve the company’s mission as a founding partner, advisor and coach provider. This marks the launch of her semi-retirement in her new home in Portugal and creates space to focus on her additional passions of photography, writing and leading “Aging in Place” communities. Please join us in our sincere gratitude to Joy Goldman for her courageous and compassionate leadership and vision as CEO of SixSEED Partners since 2020.

Joy Goldman has always been passionate about making health care healthier for all. Her multiple decades of experiences in nursing, administration and organization development (OD) within community-based and academic medical centers, coupled with more decades of coaching and consulting within healthcare shaped her inspiration to found SixSEED Partners with Cliff Kayser and Petra Platzer.

These SSP founding partners first began working together on a multi-year engagement in a large hospital system with a forward planning, leadership development focus in preparation for the CEO and other C-suite members retiring in the few years ahead. That original succession planning project went beyond conventional approaches by integrating individual and systemic development work that change “thinking structures” to better lead through complexity with courage and compassion. With Joy’s leadership, integrating individual, team and systemic approaches became a key foundation and differentiator for SSP’s work and our client’s successes.

Another SSP hallmark is applying the same leadership principles and approaches internally, as well with our clients. To that end, we began our own succession planning efforts in 2022 to ensure a smooth and stable transition for our clients, our affiliate partners and our families.

Stay tuned for Part II of this succession story – coming on November 30.

Developing Leaders As They Work

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A Practical Application of Development in the Moment

Joy W. Goldman RN, MS PCC: CEO SixSEED Partners

Our Commitment

With thanks to the great thought leaders at @theconsciousleadershipgroup for their simple graphic on knowing when you’re not present but instead responding from a place of fear or a place of playing it safe (“below the line”). Some might ask: aren’t there times when responding in fear or trying to be safe is healthy? Absolutely! The challenge in leadership is knowing that “line” between a healthy, constructive response and a response that is more from habit and one that gets in the way of success. 

At SixSEED Partners, we work with our clients on practicing in-the-moment behaviors that align with their sense of purpose AND their well-being. Read on for more details on how we are partnering in developing leaders within the context of their work and not in addition to their work.

Our Actions

In this succinct graphic, the Conscious Leadership Group highlights five warning signs for noticing when you are responding from what they call – a “below-the-line” response. These behavioral signs include blaming others, black and white thinking, wanting to have THE right answer thereby making others wrong, and shallow breathing, among others. These are normal reactions to the many challenges in our current healthcare that faces workforce shortages, burnout, and very sick patients.

In partnership with our clients, we have designed a leadership development strategy that helps leaders improve their well-being and results as they deal with patient throughput.

Our Results

At SixSEED Partners, we help our leaders lead first, from a place of courage and compassion, and then invite them to choose a way forward that is more aligned with purpose. When we come from “above the line,” as the Conscious Leadership Group describes, we are more able to see possibilities and solutions that create wins for all contributors. We are present in this moment and can think with greater clarity, focusing on desired outcomes.

With that foundation in mind, we created fieldwork where leaders practice centering when they notice their signals of being below the line and then, from a more centered place, choose a more constructive response that aligns with their individual development goals. They are also partnering with other department leaders whose support they need to improve patient throughput. Their partnering involves learning the other department’s point of view so that their empathy improves and they see each other as the human beings that they are.

Our Invitation to you

Would you like to learn more about how you can help your leaders engage others with less wear and tear on them and their teams? You can see some of our case studies here:
https://sixseedpartners.com/resources/

    Shifts Transforming Organizations

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    Joy W. Goldman RN, MS PCC: CEO SixSEED Partners

    McKinsey & Co published a report: “The State of Organizations 2023: Ten Shifts Transforming Organizations.” Post Covid life has leaders realizing “we’re not in Kansas anymore,” as Dorothy said to Toto in “The Wizard of Oz.” What has worked in the past will not work now. The challenges are different. As the report states: “The shifts include complex questions about how to organize for speed to shore up resilience, find the right balance between in-person and remote work models, address employees’ declining mental health, and build new institutional capabilities at a time of rapid technological change, among others.”

    The report outlines the results of their interviews with 2500 business leaders. Reading the list of ten shifts may have you nodding your head in agreement: “Been there, done that.” The key question is “what are the changes that can be done today that will be cause sustainable improvement?”

    At SixSEED Partners, we most agree with their second and third points for transformation: “The second and third points are “must dos,” regardless of the type of transformation undertaken: there needs to be a strong focus on cultivating talent and on investing in the leadership that will take the organization forward.”

    As they assert: This is a MUST DO: not a nice to do. This is an investment of resources: not a “cost.” We are experiencing the cost of not doing this now: imagine how we might have fared differently if we had the leadership capacity— the thinking capacity to manage the pandemic and impending workforce challenges?

    This capacity includes shifting from accountability with a few to broader, shared accountability and collaboration; from hospital-centric to system-centric; from profits to people; and integrating the best of how we’ve operated until now, with the shifts needed for the future.

    We’ve done this work with ourselves, and with our client systems. You can read some of these case studies here: https://sixseedpartners.com/resources/

    CULTURE Seed

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    Petra Platzer, PhD, NBC-HWC, PCC: COO SixSEED Partners

    Rethinking Organizational Culture: More than just the “Soft Stuff”

    In a recent LinkedIn post by Siobhán McHale, an acclaimed culture transformation expert and author of “The Insider’s Guide to Culture Change”, she invites us to take a closer look at our definition of organizational culture. In a workplace context, culture is traditionally associated with how employees feel – whether they’re happy, motivated, or satisfied. However, McHale suggests a broader and more impactful definition. Namely, culture is “a critical enabler of optimal business functioning.”

    This broader definition can unlock a missing key for many organizations. Instead of viewing culture as the byproduct of HR policies, employee satisfaction surveys or staff retreats, culture now shifts to a driver and core component of the company’s strategy for success.

    The Misunderstanding of Culture

    McHale’s post acknowledges that research on organizational culture doesn’t always show a clear link between culture and performance. The key reasons for this ambiguity include different meanings and indicators for how culture was being defined. As a result, measuring its impact has been inconsistent and difficult to clearly link.

    Yes, while culture does include how people feel at work, it’s essential to realize that culture is about so much more. Culture impacts every aspect of a healthcare organization, from access strategies and quality patient care delivery to workforce recruitment and vendor relationships. Depending on the system’s objectives, the desired culture could be adaptive, innovative, patient-centric, agile, quality-driven, growth-oriented, accountable, performance-focused, community-minded, sustainable—and the list goes on.

    The real risk lies in relegating culture to the realm of “soft” stuff, as something optional or secondary. When we appreciate culture as a strategic enabler, its ties to performance become more robust and more measurable.

    Our Journey in Re-defining Culture

    At SixSEED Partners, we support our clients in defining, or re-defining, their leadership culture. In partnering with one academic medical center over multiple years, we’ve used validated tools and cross-disciplinary designs to introduce real-time systems that support clinical excellence and promote the well-being of its clinical leaders. This journey wasn’t just about diagnosing the existing culture, but about shaping a desired one that aligns with the organization’s goals. One evident link by this multi-site leadership team’s culture work to their improved performance has been the establishment of system-wide processes that also incorporate distinct and unique hospital entities. In a multi-hospital system where an “us-them” dichotomy existed, they are successfully evolving to a cultural approach that celebrates the best of the individual organizations (“Us”) and also functions as a unified system (“We”).

    The Path Forward

    Culture is multi-faceted. It’s not just about feelings, and it’s certainly not an ‘optional extra’ to address when things settle down or there is more bandwidth. Focusing on culture is the foundation upon which the employees and the systems operate, innovate, and thrive.

    So, McHale’s question remains: Have you seen culture impact performance at your work?

    If you are ready to re-define your culture as a strategic enabler for your system to increase its performance with less challenges along the way, we’re here to make that happen with you. Reach out to us and let’s embark on this transformative journey together.

    Read the LinkedIn post from Siobhán McHale here: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/mchalesiobhan_culture-activity-7112911972588802048-H5lU?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop

    Can LinkedIn and Meta Co-exist?

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    Integrating Professional AND Personal: We bring our WHOLE selves to the workplace

    By: Joy W. Goldman RN, MS PCC:  CEO SixSEED Partners

    Background:

    As I prepare to spend more time in Europe and will be intentionally planning self- nourishing time in the morning and work in the afternoon, integrating personal and professional needs,  I am becoming ever more aware of our false separation of “professional domains” and “personal domains.”  For example, the inspiration for this post came from a song that a dear friend sent to me in honor of our friendship.  “All That You Are” by Fia Forsström is filled with both/and references.  See the excerpt posted below:

    All That You Are:  Fia Forsström.

    “I am a sinner, I am a saint
    This I have embraced
    Enjoying every aspect of life
    Perfection is dull
    And unattainable
    Leaving me craving what is real

    We came to this earth
    To experience it all
    The messy and the beautiful
    Show me that you are human
    I will kiss your scars
    Celebrating everything, all that you are”

    This post offers an invitation for us to bring ALL of us to the workplace.

    Stragtegy:

    These headings are following our typical “marketing/ LinkedIn format” and, again, I’m noticing the pull to stay within the boundaries of some pre-defined box.  NOT!  What impact would it have if we brought music, all emotions, different cultural celebrations, and color into the workplace?  In coaching, we often observe our clients for how they are getting in their own way.  Might we get out of our own way, and allow ourselves to model and embrace “all that we are:” our messiness and our beauty?  This takes conscious effort, first—to give yourself permission to bring your whole self to work, and then to notice, and invite others to do the same.

    The Solution:

    SixSEED Partners has integrated music and theater in our facilitations.  The usual reaction is initially one of skepticism, and then something magical happens.  Within minutes, people’s monkey brains relax and their hearts and spirits emerge.  Yes, there are, at times, tears:  that happens when we open our hearts and are vulnerable.  And that is often what it takes for the “real work” to happen.

    The Impact:  

    Back to the title of this blog:  Can Meta and LinkedIn coexist?  Can we bring music and heart to our professional spaces and bring thought leadership to our heart-filled spaces?  I think we can, and we must.  I am keeping this blog brief so you will have time to listen to “All That You Are” and then share that with one other person. 

    We’d love to hear about it if you do:  info@sixseedpartners.com.

    A Special Valentine’s Day Message

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    There are many definitions and manifestations of love. As we think about the last two years, the dedication and commitment that healthcare workers and leaders have shown to their patients, teams, and each other is the highest example of love in action. It takes love to show up fully, in life’s messiness; to not turn away but to stay in the mess with the intent to make things better. To our clients who show up every day, with courage and vulnerability, and despite numerous competing priorities, invest in their own and their team’s development, we say “Brava! and We love you!”

    “The important thing is not to think much, but to love much; and so do that which best stirs you to love.”
    – ST. TERESA OF ÁVILA