SixSEED Partners

Petra Platzer

SixSEED Holiday Giving – Mended Hearts

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This holiday season, we celebrate “SixSEED Holiday Giving”, where each team member donates to an organization that is meaningful.

Petra Platzer, PhD, NBC-HWC, PCC

PETRA PLATZER CONTRIBUTES TO MENDED HEARTS. For Petra, this year has found several pointers toward the Heart – from the work she and Joy have enjoyed doing with the Executive Committee of the Heart & Vascular Institute at Centra Health; to the latest Brene Brown book (Atlas of the Heart: Mapping Meaningful Connection and the Language of Human Experience); and getting to work closely with her new colleague Dr. Nieca Goldberg, a nationally recognized pioneer in women’s heart health. The most poignant of all for Petra is her mom’s recent diagnosis of Atrial Fibrillation, and the journey she’s been on surrounding the ER trips and various doctor’s appointments surrounding that diagnosis. The support she has received from Mended Hearts outside of those medical care processes has been pivotal for how Petra’s mom is now able to navigate her own health and wellness amidst this new illness. That is why this year, Petra is supporting Mended Hearts, just as they have been supporting her mom. 

ABOUT MENDED HEARTS

The Mended Hearts program is the nation’s premier peer-support program for patients who have cardiovascular disease, their caregivers, and their families. Since its humble beginning in 1951, Mended Hearts has served millions by providing support and education, bringing awareness to issues that those living with heart disease face, and advocating to improve quality of life across the lifespan. Learn more about this organization at https://mendedhearts.org/.

Case Study: Applying Polarity Principles for a Healthcare IT Start-UP

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Petra Platzer, PhD, NBC-HWC, PCC; Cliff Kayser MSHR, MSOD, PCC; Dave Levin MD

Background

The complexity, fragmentation, and highly regulated aspects of the U.S. healthcare system results in making the industry resistant to change. Despite the resistance, healthcare has undergone significant change in reimbursement models, consumerism, and information technologies (IT). A small, IT healthcare start-up challenged itself to embrace the reality within the tension between Stability (current status) and Change (future status) versus resisting that change. To support this IT start-up in this intentional process, “NewCo” partnered with SixSEED Partners (SSP) in using the Polarity Approach for Continuity and Transformation (PACT™).

The Strategy:

The first step for NewCo was to establish the NewCo Culture Team (NCT), which was a highly diverse microcosm that had executive sponsorship. The NCT met regularly to guide culture development and determined they would assess the current state of NewCo by conducting an employee “SWOT” survey to analyze Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats.

The Solution: 

Guided by SixSEED, the NCT learned how the Polarity Map™ could supplement and enhance their original SWOT result analyses. While a standard SWOT implicitly focuses on important dimensions of stability and change, what it misses analyzing are the interdependent connections between those SWOT dimensions. As the NCT and NewCo began to more broadly understand how this and other interdependencies work, they began to see polarity tensions that were a part of discussion or debate in their day-to-day workflow. 

One example of this occurred when a group was meeting to discuss a customer’s “overly excessive” technical support needs. Concerns mostly focused on what the customer was “doing wrong” until a staff member suggested that this might be a polarity: Customer Needs And NewCo Needs. The dynamic of the conversation quickly shifted as members mapped the dynamic. Capturing the wisdom in the Polarity Map™ allowed the group to see a more complete picture of the ongoing tension and enabled them to develop a more productive solution strategy for NewCo and the Customer.

Another example related to NewCo’s merger with a similar size and stage company. Emotionally-laden struggles existed as the company wrestled with whether work could be done remotely or required people to be in a central office as the merged companies had different practices.  Initial discussions were framed as either/or which was causing undue stress and conflict.  A NewCo executive team member was able to lead the new team through a polarity mapping exercise to identify the benefits of Office-based and Remote work, as well as the limitations of each, without the other.

The Impact:

Polarity principles were successfully applied in a small, highly dynamic healthcare IT start-up environment that intentionally focused on building culture. Leveraging polarities played a key role in NewCo’s successful growth, from a few co-founders with an idea to a company with 45 employees, while weathering many storms – including successfully merging with another company.

8 Steps to Become More Resilient

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Appreciating The Center for Creative Leadership and DavidMcLean for sharing these insights

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

Background:  

As the world experiences a massive “re-entry” after being in fear and reactivity mode for the past eighteen months, becoming more resilient is on many people’s minds. David McLean, Director of People and Organizational Development at Lambton College recently highlighted on LinkedIn, a Center for Creative Leadership (CCL) article on eight steps you can take to become more resilient.  We share David’s interest in resilience as we promote Well-Being for those who work in healthcare.

Appreciations:

David’s brief and succinct expansion on the wonderful graphic shared by the CCL in 2016 remains relevant for today.  We notice elements of Daniel Pink’s Drive Model®: Purpose; Autonomy and Mastery; Carol Dweck’s: growth mindset® (learner mindset); Simon Sinek’s: “Why®,” and David Emerald’s work around The Empowerment Dynamic®, amongst others.  These eight steps, as identified by the Leading Effectively staff in November of last year summarize very well actions in our control to become more resilient with whatever comes our way.

The embedded article expands on these eight steps to include taking care of one’s physical health including getting enough sleep and prioritizing exercise.  They expand on reflection to include a journaling practice.  All great suggestions with proven impact.

Yes, AND…..

I can imagine the sarcastic responses I might hear from those who’ve been working tirelessly to take care of others, allowing little time to spend on themselves.  Is it lack of knowledge that prevents leaders from cultivating these habits or something else?  It reminds me of the way we’ve approached “solving” the burnout issue within healthcare.  Within our work at SixSEED Partners, as we take an ecosystem and system-integration approach to dealing with complexity, we advocate individual AND system responsibilities to create a generative culture and resilient leadership.  Well-Being/ Resilience is not only an individual challenge; it is a cultural one as well.

I most agree with these writers that the mirror has to be turned inward.  We need to abolish blame-filled cultures and ask our individual and collective selves, with courage and compassion:  “how am I / are we contributing to the challenge I /we see before me/ us?”  And we must ask this question when we are rested and healthy.  We cannot see the horizon if we’re still buried beneath the earth.

Let’s hear from you

If you’d like to chat about a methodical and systemic approach that supports the individual and systemic change and resilience, we’d love to hear from you. Please message us on our LinkedIn page or send us an email here.

#culture, #systemintegration, #wellbeing



Acknowledgment: Centre for Creative Leadership


#learningagility #leadership #resiliency

Team Spotlight: Meet Cliff

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Cliff Kayser is the CSO for SixSEED Partners. For the last 25 years, Cliff has been a practitioner and teacher of applied behavioral science theories and applications – most specifically in the area of values and polarity values dynamics. Cliff most enjoys working in partnership with clients who embrace or are ready to embrace both technical and adaptive approaches to leadership.

He says, “With the commitment to supplementing adaptive with technical in a ‘both/and’ leadership approach, generative and sustainable results will follow – and those results are measurable.” Cliff is a founding partner of SSP and appreciates healthcare for its role as a catalyst for well-being and love – worldwide. Current healthcare-related initiatives include work with a foundation in the Middle East and North Africa as part of Ain Shams University to use polarity thinking as part of leadership development for medical educators. (See published research on this work here!) Learn more about Cliff here.

Shifting from Reactive to Proactive Work

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“How does our executive team become more proactive and less reactive? We are so busy putting out fires, but we’re not really moving forward on what the organization needs from us.”

If you have been asking yourself the same question, you are in good company. This year is a prime example that the one constant in life is change – which brings with it unknowns and an increasing pace of so many variables in the day-to-day and the big picture.

The Challenge

For the client who asked the question above, her clinical organization had acquired several other practices as a strategic move to keep each practice viable in this current economic climate. As a result, there were some key leadership changes, along with a need to establish a new organizational culture and vision. Instead of proactively working on those elements, the executive team was instead spending many hours reacting to perpetual fire drills, like EMR integration and compliance issues.

The Diagnosis

In an earlier blog, we introduced the concept of an Outcome Orientation. Just like a compass, this mindset puts our focus towards the results we want to achieve, instead of the alternate mindset of getting rid of the problem(s). One way to “diagnose” which orientation we are operating from, is by asking the 3rd Vital Question from David Emerald’s 3 Vital Questions™ (3VQ) framework: “What Actions are You Taking?” 

If the answer involves merely reacting to the problems of the moment, without any intentional actions focused on continuous improvement or forward progress toward the prioritized outcome, your diagnosis is clear: you are operating from the Problem Orientation. And just like the example, when we are operating from this orientation, we can feel stuck, frustrated, and burnt-out. We are also more likely to be experiencing and contributing to workplace drama from this orientation.

The Tension 

Once you have your diagnosis, you can proactively choose to take a different set of actions. 

How? By harnessing the inherent energy that is in the gap between the Outcome you want to achieve and the Current Reality that exists. This inherent energy, called Dynamic Tension follows the fundamentals of physics: to create movement between two points, tension is required. The pivotal key is developing the skill to “hold the tension” in a way that the rubber band doesn’t snap (too big a gap/tension) or fall off (too small a gap/tension) when the default reactive patterns show up again. In our experience, when clients become aware of the need and positive attributes for this kind of tension, this understanding can liberate them to work on becoming proactive.

The Shift to Proactive Actions

Once you’ve defined the Outcome you want and assessed your Current Reality, you have started working on the 5-step Action Planning Process to create proactive actions! Similar to climbing a ladder – one does not reach the top by starting at the first rung and jumping to the top rung. By using this foundational structure, however, you are able to identify baby steps – one rung at a time – resulting in incremental, deliberate, and long-term actions.

As we have been applying the planning process with the executive team from our client example, we can already see a lift in their individual energy, more cohesion as a team, and a change in their approaches for their expanded organizational culture. This is another great example of why we integrate the 3 Vital Questions™ framework within our SixSEED Partners solutions for all of our 6 service “seeds”!

Are you driving, or being driven, by change?

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In a recent blog, we highlighted the different stages of change and asked the first of 3 Vital Questions™ (3VQ) to help navigate the drama we can often feel within any Change Process:  “Where are you putting your focus?” 

Through working with clients, and in self-reflection, it’s always enlightening to notice how the answer to that first vital question drives our internal emotions, which leads to the type of actions we take next. A great example of this came from a recent conversation with a client, who was just starting out in a new role within his system. He shared he was feeling overwhelmed and didn’t feel in the driver’s seat. His strategy to gain control was to focus on de-prioritizing certain initiatives, but he was not feeling good about sharing that with his CEO. Through our conversation, we explored shifting his mindset to focusing on what he IS prioritizing during this timeframe. He instantly noticed his self-criticism decreasing and his energy enthusiasm for the meeting with his CEO increasing. He was amazed at the difference. 

The Difference

When you are inside a Change Process – whether it’s something big or small – have you ever noticed how you are feeling or acting in specific moments? Have you heard yourself think things like, “they didn’t even talk to me and just decided” or “these meetings just keep showing up, so I don’t have time for self-care”, etc.?

Have you had other times where you said things like, “it’s not ideal, but how can we all pull together to make this work?” or “the weather turned out different than I planned, so I’ll adjust to still get a workout in”, etc.?

Do you notice the different tone of who is in the driver’s seat in these examples? Taking notice of the tone and/or word choice is an important clue and vital skill to develop. 

“The way of seeing yourself and your life experience determines how you relate to the world around you. Your orientation defines your reality.” – David Emerald

The Second Vital Question

So, how can you develop this skill? By pausing to ask “How am I relating to myself/to the experience/to others?”

Try asking yourself the above question in your next opportunity and take notice of what you find. If you notice yourself more like a passenger – without the hope or belief you can do something in that situation – that’s an indicator you are relating from the “Dreaded Drama Triangle” (DDT), originating from work by Dr. Stephen Karpman. Inside this dynamic – both with ourselves and with others – we reliably take on certain roles, all of which create a cycle of toxic cycle in the experience.

Alternatively, if you notice yourself more like a driver – with belief you have some options for how you will get to the destination – then, you are relating from “The Empowerment Dynamic*” (TED*), developed by David Emerald. Operating from this dynamic, we again reliably take on certain roles, as shown in the diagram. However, unlike with the DDT roles, coming from the TED*. These roles, puts us in the driver’s seat to create action steps towards the long-term result(s) we want to achieve.

How to Shift Gears

By knowing about these different dynamics, we now can choose. For our client mentioned in the earlier example, he began by taking his foot off the gas pedal long enough for us to look at the 1st and 2nd Vital Questions. Once he saw where he was putting his focus (1st Vital Question), he was able to see from the 2nd Vital Question that he was still operating as a “passenger” in the situation. Once he put himself in the driver’s seat internally, he was able to approach his conversation with his CEO more effectively and confidently.

To effectively lead ourselves and our teams through any change, asking this 2nd Vital Question is another key step to shift gears into the driver’s seat to get to the ultimate destination.  

At SixSEED Partners, we work with our clients to navigate their current and future situations using each of the 3 Vital Questions™, which, when used collectively, improves the well-being of individuals, teams and the overall dynamics within a company’s culture.