SixSEED Partners

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Leveraging Creative and Reactive Thinking for Leadership Impact

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Advanced Practice Provider (APP) Development Case Study: Academic Medicine

SixSEED Partners Affiliates: Lisa Hompe RN, MSOD, ACC; Vinay Kumar, PCC

Background

SixSEED Partners (SSP) co-created and facilitated two virtual leadership sessions working with an Academic Medical Center Advanced Practice Provider (APP) Director and her team of over 25 frontline clinical Nurse Practitioner (NP) and Physician Assistant (PA) leaders.

The Director desired to improve the capacity and leadership skills of her leadership team to then cascade the learning within their teams. These leaders had been stretched with multiple demands, including COVID-19 and staffing shortages. The intent was to provide leadership development for the APP leaders that would be rejuvenating, thought-provoking, and result in a greater sense of team and compassion.

The Strategy

The engagement consisted of two targeted two-hour virtual sessions, held four months apart. The structure supported dyad and small group activities and fieldwork assignments between the two sessions.

The sessions focused on providing the leaders with a framework for creating a mindset shift in perspective and allowing for less reactive behavior and more outcome-focused and purpose-driven creative expression. The content illustrated how majority of leadership happens through communication and conversations.

The first session used the content from the Conscious Leadership Group: Above and Below the Line thinking with practical solutions to switching from below the line to above the line behaviors. The second session reviewed the shared individual and collective learning results that happened between the sessions and focused on the additional content of David Emerald’s Dreaded Drama Triangle (DDT) and The Empowerment Dynamic (TED).  The sessions supported the noticing of oneself to make the shift from a victim mindset to that of a creator mindset.

The Solution

The work created a virtual space for connection, renewal, and rejuvenation. Through interactive dialogue and reflection, the sessions targeted the level of thinking that creates energy that is generative and not draining.

The introduction of small mindfulness exercises at the beginning of the sessions helped shift the team to being present and focused and offered tools for use in the leader’s day-to-day work. The facilitation and content structure supported partnering, shared accountability, and self-awareness.

The models supported a forward-looking, solution-oriented common language for noticing individual and collective leadership behaviors and created a container for exploring relational team dynamics and interactions.

The Impact

The work explored the relationship between a leader’s mental, emotional & physical state and the quality of their conversations, interactions, relationships, results, and effectiveness. This translated to the leaders’ ability to intentionally apply coaching and listening skills with their own teams for a greater, more positive impact.

Through interactive dialogue and facilitation, the participants were able to do courageous work in expanding their own thinking to add purpose-driven, authentic expression to an already strong foundation of problem-solving leadership behaviors. The group walked away with insights to put into practice in their day-to-day work.

The Director said, “this team, in their roles, is always focused on ‘getting to yes ‘ and this work has helped the team to find calm and joy and helps us recover from exhaustion” and it helps them notice “where they are” at any given moment. Others reflected that what was meaningful was learning to notice on purpose and being able to “be at the eye of the storm with courage and confidence”.

The introduction of these models and tools helped to support individual and collective effectiveness. It planted seeds for a future filled with possibilities, while creating a psychologically safe space for dialogue, listening, and vulnerability of their shared experiences.

If you’d like to learn more about how you can bring this tool to your leaders, contact us at SixSEED Partners.

NOVA Conference Opening Video

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On December 1st, Brian Berman, President of the Nova Institute for Health and Founding Director of the Center for Integrative Medicine, University of Maryland School of Medicine, presented “Integrated whole-systems approaches at all scales: for health, healing, and flourishing.” The conference opening video is worth two minutes of your time.

The Nova Institute’s Goal is: The ultimate aim of planetary health is flourishing along every level of the person, place, and planet continuum. In an era of so many interconnected challenges, there could not be a more important time for ambitious, integrative approaches.” Dr. Berman is quoted: “In challenging times there are also great opportunities to reach beyond boundaries and fundamentally shift how we think about well-being at all scales.”

At SixSEED Partners, our mission is to provide integrated solutions to heal healthcare. Supporting and implementing the tools from the IDG are critical to our mission for sustainable change.

Leveraging 360-degree Feedback for Systemic Impact

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Physician Development Case Study: Academic Medicine

By:Joy Goldman RN, MS, PCC:  CEO SixSEED Partners, BSN, ACC

Background:

SixSEED Partners (SSP) participated in a coaching engagement with an Academic Medical Center physician leader.  Halfway into the engagement, we agreed to complete a 360-degree feedback process in support of the client’s ongoing systemic leadership and development.  The leader wanted to improve her leadership and also be able to cascade the learning to her physician partners.  The Leadership Circle 360 Profile (LCP) was administered to help hone in on priority development efforts.

Strategy:

The client’s role interfaced with faculty, residents, fellows, and administrators so the respondent group was very diverse.  The client’s results demonstrated high creative leadership (3-4 dimensions rated 80% or above yet there was a perceptual gap between self-ratings and that of others.(for detail on the tool, see The Leadership Circle Website).  Of note was the client’s self-rating in the 89 percentile for Passive, and respondents’ ratings of 81 percentile for Distance (reactive dimensions).  The client also had rated themselves in the 7% for courageous authenticity while her respondents rated her in the 53%.  What was clear was that the client was holding back and not bringing their full self and talents to the organization and the energy spent on protecting and playing it safe was draining.

The Solution:

As we explored internal and external dynamics, we found support in the theoretical frameworks of the Empowerment Dynamic, and Polarity Thinking which correlate perfectly with the LCP framework of reactive and creative modes of energy management.  Through coaching and much reflection, the client was able to see how his direct reports were placing him in a rescuer (hero) role and were presenting themselves as victims to system leaders, mainly hospital Presidents who were perceived as villains (see graphic).  This dynamic was evident through numerous cultural stories in the organization—not only did this dynamic occur within his organization:  it was prevalent throughout the system, with a displacement of accountability to “higher-ups,” which was also convenient when something didn’t work.  Blame was a well-known song sung throughout the system.

Impact:  

From the client’s perspective, he was able to see that he was re-enacting that dynamic with his boss and part of his development was to be conscious of the roles he was playing and putting on others.  He started individual meetings with his direct reports and shared the distinctions between victim and creator, encouraging them to take ownership and identify actions they can take to influence what they wanted to create in the system.

The client was also challenged to lead a system-level leadership development effort where both/and thinking (polarity thinking) would be introduced and measured for the prevalent tensions of Centralization and Decentralization (system service lines AND local hospital entities) and Individual AND Team accountabilities.  In this way, he would broaden the leadership capacity of system leaders which would minimize the victim/persecutor conversations and support mutual accountability throughout the system.

Are victim/ persecutor conversations rampant in your organization?  Are you fatigued in having to spend time on these draining discussions that result in stagnation and energy drain?  We feel your pain!  Contact us to learn how you can lead sustainable, empowering change in your system!