so this is something that happened to me
00:40
on Saturday which I thought a perfect
00:45
way to start this session so the whole
00:47
day was actually free
00:48
I had nothing scheduled that I had to go
00:51
to or do and so I thought well I've got
00:55
to get that work-life balance talked
00:57
whipped into shape here so that's what
01:00
I'll work on and then somebody my family
01:04
came to me and said how would you like
01:05
to go for a walk I said no no I have to
01:09
work on this talk on work-life balance
01:11
and in that moment the irony hit me
01:15
harder than I would have imagined it's
01:17
really hard it's really hard to to make
01:23
decisions around the work that you
01:25
really want to do and want to do well I
01:28
this wasn't something I shouldn't have
01:30
been doing and spending time personal
01:33
time family time other kinds of you know
01:36
time and and to somehow integrate all of
01:39
those so what today what I'm going to do
01:42
is we're going to talk about some kind
01:46
of conceptual issues around the topic
01:48
the concept of work-life at the
01:51
beginning and talk about some assessment
01:53
techniques you can use if you want to
01:55
I'm trying to focus on kind of concrete
01:57
strategies that you could try there will
02:00
be a little bit that will be overlap ish
02:03
with the last session but not much how
02:05
many people are coming here for the
02:08
first time today it'll be the first time
02:09
okay all right so we'll go through them
02:12
but but maybe a little bit more quickly
02:14
and if you have questions I'll take
02:17
questions from you too but Noctor not
02:19
dr. Dusek she's she's on her own for
02:21
that so we'll cover that and through all
02:26
of this I want it to be clear that I
02:28
don't have I don't think anybody has
02:30
final answers for you about how to do
02:32
this so I'll just throw ideas out you'll
02:35
think about as we go along what things
02:37
you might like to try or what that
02:39
triggers for you to try to make your own
02:41
life more a higher quality really you're
02:44
going for a higher quality life maybe
02:45
that you have right now
02:46
so does that sound fair enough and there
02:49
are lots of
02:50
resources out there that you can find
02:51
I'm sure their TED talks about this I
02:53
thought about looking for some and I
02:55
thought no I have to go in that walk so
02:56
no TED talks no TED talks for you today
03:01
okay so oh so first we're gonna talk it
03:09
I'm sorry I the first thing we were
03:13
talking about is what this concept means
03:16
to you because it only has meaning to
03:18
you not everybody who's gonna have a
03:20
slightly different definition so what
03:22
I'd like us to think about is what does
03:27
work life mean and what does balance
03:30
mean and what would you think of as B as
03:35
a sort of a metric for yourself about
03:37
what would look like a high-quality life
03:40
that encompasses all of the things that
03:42
you want it to hold okay let's dismiss
03:46
right off the bat this idea of true
03:48
balance where you add up how many things
03:50
you have divided by 18 and then it's how
03:54
you assign the number of hours that you
03:55
spend on every day no I I don't think
03:58
anybody really thinks that that's what
03:59
balance means in this case but if you do
04:03
I think no nobody out there that writes
04:05
about this or thinks about it for very
04:07
long would think that that's true
04:08
so I thought maybe if it's okay with you
04:10
if you are energized enough to maybe at
04:12
your tables not talk about your own
04:15
personal vision so much as kind of what
04:17
you think the elements are with what
04:19
would be the elements of a good
04:21
work-life integration or whatever we
04:24
want to call it yeah and me or what
04:28
metric you would use to know that you've
04:29
achieved it either one of those are both
04:32
so do you mine would you at your tables
04:34
just talk about that a little bit and
04:36
we'll capture a few of the ideas on this
04:38
whiteboard I'll give you about what in
04:39
five minutes does that sound right five
04:41
or six minutes introduce yourself
04:46
at your table if you don't know each
04:47
other
04:52
okay why don't we why don't we come back
04:55
to the group I'm sure you have more
04:57
things you'd like to talk about but we
04:59
could vote just to stop and spend the
05:01
rest of the time but no probably
05:03
probably not a good idea huh
05:04
so what I'd like to do is go to each
05:05
table and have you say one thing that's
05:07
not already written down in the board
05:09
and let's just see how many how many
05:10
ideas we we can get so why don't we
05:13
start with this table over here just
05:14
what one thing that you came up with
05:16
went one thought Oh that'd be a good
05:19
idea probably yeah one of the metrics we
05:21
came up with who is kind of defined by
05:24
other people that are important to us in
05:26
our lives okay okay good so so how they
05:35
are yeah okay okay good good
05:41
these will all be good so I won't keep
05:43
saying that what about this anything if
05:51
you don't have anything that's okay you
05:52
can pass if the table doesn't everything
05:54
they want to add that's fine no worries
05:56
I don't know how to put this into one
05:58
word but we were saying balances where
06:01
we felt like we weren't being we weren't
06:04
cheating either sighs oh okay
06:06
okay no good that's good you don't have
06:08
to say one word by the way what sentence
06:10
I was hoping for that's I like that
06:13
quite a bit so far I like everything
06:15
I've written down here I'm just gonna
06:22
put part meaning you get to fill in the
06:25
blanks about what parts are important to
06:26
you what about yeah let's do this
06:28
easily for the microphone do the two of
06:30
you have anything I guess they're
06:32
similar so to not have our work elements
06:36
in coaching into our life and like being
06:39
able to make sure that you've got to
06:41
have dinner with your family every night
06:42
okay okay so a subset of this not
06:46
cheating any part is is a common
06:49
situation is when work actually
06:51
encroaches on personal so that's for a
06:59
lot of people that's the biggest thing
07:00
not always though
07:02
yeah back here so we kind of went a
07:07
little off script maybe I won't write
07:10
your accountant okay
07:11
fair enough so we were talking about the
07:14
idea that it's really not so much
07:16
work-life balance as this idea of what
07:18
energizes us and what depletes us and
07:21
there are depleting things in both work
07:24
and yeah life and there are things that
07:26
are energizing and nourishing in both of
07:29
those domains as well and so really kind
07:33
of redefining the scales yeah so that
07:37
would be more of a we more of a
07:46
integrative in the sense that you're not
07:47
looking at these two kinds of
07:49
educational activities and then looking
07:51
to see among those what yeah but good
07:55
idea where are we here this table to
07:58
everything
08:06
[Music]
08:07
- teeny take you yeah yeah so this would
08:12
be a strategy some take vacation
08:22
absolutely
08:41
and I prefer actually to say work
08:44
personal or professional and personal
08:46
because everything you do is work in
08:48
some physic sense of the things and life
08:51
makes it if you say work life it sounds
08:53
like your work is really not part of
08:55
your life so personally I like the
08:57
professional personal mix okay
09:06
okay so the thing is whenever you have
09:08
big changes in either one you have to
09:10
reevaluate that's really critical just
09:12
like with your time management system in
09:13
your lists and so forth you have to
09:15
change those every time you get new
09:16
stuff or get rid of stuff you've got to
09:18
make sure your system works so great
09:20
what about this table anything to add
09:48
could we expand that to say expand I
09:52
mean for you know in certain situations
09:53
that'd be the main thing but you also
09:55
don't want to have cyclic psychological
09:56
discomfort right so a metric would be
10:00
well well no no I get I get but so
10:04
having limit how about that limit I'd
10:09
like to say eliminate but a physical
10:14
emotional discomfort and that would be a
10:19
subset of depleting forces yeah
10:35
and so it's it's a big picture sort of
10:38
writ large is any kind of pain yeah good
10:40
do you have anything here
10:53
you'll be
11:20
and and another one that you said was to
11:25
abandon guilt
11:28
yeah good anything else anybody we're
11:32
not trying to come up with a
11:33
comprehensive definition here or we're
11:35
just trying to come up with some ideas
11:37
for you to work with when you're
11:38
thinking about your own want any changes
11:40
that you might need to make so let's see
11:42
what do we see here so you know what I
11:48
what I see in this part is the thing
11:50
that maybe one of you said or somebody
11:53
said maybe it was me I can't remember
11:54
that you want to look at all the parts
11:56
of your life that you're currently
11:57
focusing on and make sure you're not
11:58
that you're doing something in all of
12:01
them to keep them from falling behind or
12:05
damaging relationships you want to be
12:09
more positive than that I guess but so
12:12
this is a really good I really like that
12:13
list and these are some strategies sort
12:16
of little ones if in a way of taking
12:19
vacation and time off when you when you
12:22
should if you have it is that hard to do
12:25
here do people not use their vacation we
12:31
don't know the answer to that do you use
12:33
your vacation there we go
12:36
okay oh okay
12:39
and then this idea that every time
12:41
something big changes you have triplets
12:43
for example that'll change your thoughts
12:45
about you know professional personal
12:48
balance that there even one you don't
12:49
even need three at a time and being
12:51
present is a common strategy we'll talk
12:54
about a little bit more okay okay this
12:56
is good so this gets you thinking I hope
12:57
a little bit about your own weight so
12:59
you should all think about Oh think
13:01
about what what you'd like that you know
13:05
what metrics you'd like to use and then
13:06
that gives you a way to start thinking
13:08
about the strategies that you want to
13:10
use to get there so it's like any other
13:13
project plan you know define what you
13:15
want your what you think you want your
13:16
outcome to look like and then start
13:20
working on it so let me just point out a
13:23
couple of things that I don't think are
13:26
up here so much
13:28
one of the problems with talking about
13:29
work even professional personal is that
13:32
we think of work even though it's not as
13:34
sort of a unitary unitary homogeneous
13:38
set of activities and we think of the
13:40
personal stuff as like an activity when
13:43
in fact that's not true at all we we
13:46
have different we have many different
13:47
roles often within our in our personal
13:50
life so we're not trying to just duggle
13:52
duggle to things we're trying to juggle
13:55
as in the case of this person who who is
13:57
a clinician and a scientist and a
13:59
partner and as children and a triathlete
14:03
any triathletes here you could do it
14:07
what's that there we go and maybe have
14:10
some kind of community involvement so it
14:13
you're not just balancing two things
14:15
you're balancing in this case six things
14:17
does that make sense so you want to you
14:19
don't want to think in these big giant
14:21
categories but to think about the
14:23
individual things that you're actually
14:24
wanting to be involved in and then the
14:27
other thing that so this is a little bit
14:30
we won't be talking about a lot of data
14:32
today but this comes from a
14:35
meta-analysis a few years ago where they
14:39
looked at what were the causes of what's
14:43
called in the literature
14:44
work family conflict so it turns out
14:47
that for a lot of people the problem
14:51
isn't work versus personal in general
14:54
the real problem is work family
14:57
conflicts because with family there's
15:00
more potential for and that's loosely
15:04
translated into kids and other people
15:06
that you're caring for because the
15:08
potential for scheduling conflicts gets
15:10
to be so high and need for time off with
15:12
family as opposed to other things that
15:14
you're doing I
15:15
supposing that's the reason it's such a
15:17
big deal but there's lots and lots of
15:19
research work on research that's been
15:22
done on work family conflict and so this
15:27
from this article the conclusions with
15:30
the big conclusions were that both men
15:32
and women have this sometimes there's a
15:34
belief that only women have work family
15:35
conflict but actually that's not true
15:39
who does have a bigger conflict
15:41
parents which if any of you have
15:44
children you know that that
15:45
automatically adds a level of complexity
15:48
and when you experience work-family
15:51
conflict your overall job and life
15:55
satisfaction faction is at risk for
15:57
going down in both arenas and it's a
16:00
risk factor for for burnout so that's
16:03
kind of that part and in terms of kind
16:07
of some sub categories and this is maybe
16:13
a little heart when I say both
16:14
directions are associated with job
16:16
stress family stress and family conflict
16:21
when you're working crutches on your
16:23
family it affects all of those things
16:26
your job as well as your family and when
16:29
your family is encroaching on your work
16:31
which actually happens more than you
16:34
would think it leads to the very same
16:36
problems with job stress families so
16:38
either direction and coaching on the
16:40
other is a problem now this article was
16:43
not really intended to talk about
16:45
evidence-based approaches - it wasn't
16:49
focused on what helps but it did have a
16:52
little summary in the discussion and
16:54
some things here that you wouldn't you
16:56
wouldn't be surprised about then if you
16:58
have an effective coping style that you
17:01
can use when problems come up and if you
17:03
are have a good level of resilience
17:05
those obviously would help and they do
17:08
interestingly supportive family or
17:13
supportive conflicts can help her
17:15
colleagues so if you have both then
17:19
that's terrific but if you have
17:21
supportive colleagues that can actually
17:22
help with work family conflict and and
17:25
vice versa with a supportive family so
17:28
it's nice if you have both but you don't
17:30
have to and then they did say something
17:32
about time management which I see I put
17:34
a little exclamation point because I
17:35
thought well I know something about that
17:36
but figuring out you in time how you're
17:40
gonna allocate how you're gonna allocate
17:42
your time across these different things
17:43
is obviously good so I always try to
17:48
keep in mind that that for a lot of
17:50
people the work family problem is really
17:53
the one that
17:54
need to focus on I don't have a lot of
17:58
good jokes for this for this talk oh oh
18:03
if you think of any just shout them out
18:04
I'll try to work on that so let's talk
18:07
now this is another sort of my way of
18:09
introduction and ideas for you to think
18:11
about section some people at least
18:17
believe that the mindset you bring to
18:18
the situation makes a big difference in
18:20
how you experience them and there is a
18:22
little bit of - any kind of problem
18:24
there conflict that you're facing
18:25
between different parts of your life and
18:28
some of these are backed up by evidence
18:29
so let me just show you some ideas here
18:32
and you can think about whether you have
18:34
any of these beliefs that may be
18:37
limiting your ability to have better
18:40
integration or not so this is the first
18:44
one is one we talked about - somebody
18:47
sent this morning which is that you
18:48
can't you may be able to do anything but
18:51
you can't do it everything so people
18:54
often in academic medicine get caught up
18:57
in this because they had they're curious
18:59
people they're smart people there are a
19:00
lot of things they want to read there
19:01
are a lot of things they want to do they
19:03
want to make progress in their career
19:04
and so forth so they agree to do more
19:06
things that they can possibly have time
19:08
to do and then similarly in our personal
19:10
lives due to the wonders of the internet
19:13
we can actually get involved in anything
19:15
we want and learn how to do it and start
19:17
doing it right away
19:18
so one time for example I googled how to
19:23
climb Mount Everest for the first time
19:24
now I had actually no interest nor would
19:27
I ever have interest in doing this but I
19:29
found two websites that said here's
19:31
exactly what you do step by step and I
19:34
thought whoa for just a split second or
19:37
freezer cooking
19:39
does anybody here do freezer cooking
19:41
it's it's the at the extreme version of
19:44
it is that you just cook one weekend a
19:46
month and everything is frozen and then
19:49
so you have to shop all day Saturday
19:51
cook all day Sunday I tried this once
19:53
and I collapsed on Sunday night so I
19:55
thought well this is not for me but
19:57
there are there are or you want to take
19:59
up any quilters here
20:01
no quilters this is the first time oh
20:04
good I've never had an audience without
20:06
a quilter in it
20:07
this size and so if it may you may have
20:10
decided to take up quilting just at the
20:11
very time you're thinking about
20:12
promotion two years from now
20:14
and now you have this hobby that takes a
20:16
whole room filled with looms piles of
20:19
material everywhere and you know what
20:22
I'm talking about here and it's a small
20:25
closet she's not a real culture so far
20:27
as I can tell so we can really take on
20:30
anything we want and because we're
20:32
interested in and curious we do it so we
20:34
end up with more than we can really do
20:36
normally I make the audience recite
20:38
aloud recite this aloud with me should
20:41
we do it let's do it I may be able to do
20:46
hey hey but I can't do everything so we
20:50
have to do it twice because you did a
20:52
poor job you you always do a poor job
20:54
the first time right so it doesn't
20:55
really matter okay I may be able to do
20:57
anything but I can't do everything and
21:00
actually this by itself is a problem for
21:02
a lot of people who are upbeat energetic
21:04
they just have taken on too much and
21:06
that's the problem that's not always the
21:09
problem but that is sometimes we'll talk
21:10
a little bit about how to sort that out
21:12
in in a minute so here are some mindsets
21:16
for which there is some data so there's
21:20
a little study that was and there may be
21:21
more data than this this is the only
21:23
study I know about it was a study of
21:25
mid-career women who had participated
21:27
early in their career in a Robert Wood
21:29
Johnson career development program and
21:31
the investigators decided to go back and
21:34
check in with these women several years
21:36
later to find out how they were doing
21:38
what they're how they felt about life
21:40
and work satisfaction and and then so
21:42
they did some instruments of various
21:44
things and what they found was that
21:46
there were two broad groups here there
21:48
were women who weren't doing very well
21:50
academically or personally and the group
21:55
that was doing well and the locus of
21:58
control was different between these two
21:59
groups so women who believed that all of
22:01
their problems were coming from outside
22:03
of themselves we're not doing very well
22:05
and the people who said oh well there's
22:07
a lot of problems out there but I have
22:09
to control what I can control they were
22:11
the group that was most satisfied
22:13
overall and with work so I don't know
22:15
how easy it is to change your locus of
22:17
control but if you think that you have
22:20
that
22:21
one that blames is sort of blaming other
22:23
forces for preventing you you might
22:25
think about whether you you might want
22:27
to reevaluate that did that make sense
22:29
does that just happen it's kind of
22:31
intuitive but there we have some data
22:35
and the next one is the belief that your
22:38
goals are compatible so there's a study
22:41
that was done in the north is a it was a
22:45
study of sixteen hundred sixteen
22:48
thousand women in the Northwest United
22:51
States who worked and were married that
22:54
were those that were those were the two
22:56
criteria and they looked at a whole
23:00
variety of things but they included
23:03
depressive symptoms I don't know if they
23:05
did a clinical diagnosis of depression I
23:07
can't remember and so it's a
23:10
longitudinal study so like six or eight
23:11
years later they did a baseline
23:13
assessment of a variety of things and
23:15
then they did the the post assessment
23:18
and at the end of the assessment think
23:20
they found that women who felt that they
23:24
had to be really good mothers because I
23:27
think they all really good like super
23:29
moms mothers and they had to do well at
23:30
work we're more likely to be depressed
23:32
than women who said oh well I can't do
23:35
everything perfectly I'm just going to
23:37
do the best I can at home and at work
23:39
and they did better they were doing
23:41
better psychologically they were less
23:42
depressed so there's something about
23:45
thinking you have to be perfect at
23:46
everything that can lead to trouble here
23:49
and I think that's what my next point is
23:51
so there we go now the next mindsets are
23:57
just things that are true we don't need
23:59
any data to prove them and that is no
24:02
matter what you're trying to do there
24:03
are going to be obstacles and people
24:04
easily get discouraged by those
24:06
sometimes and kind of give up on making
24:08
positive changes so just recognizing
24:10
that there will always be obstacles no
24:12
matter what changes you try to make it
24:16
helps you to think about it from a
24:17
problem-solving point of view or a
24:19
solution point of view instead of
24:21
getting drugged down by the fact that
24:23
there are obstacles and this is an
24:26
interesting one which I had never heard
24:29
about before but it turns out there's
24:31
quite a bit written about this idea as
24:33
well
24:34
and it stems actually from a Harvard
24:37
Business Review or a Harvard professor
24:39
of Business who Clayton Christensen who
24:44
it twelve years ago or something like
24:47
that when he was in his forties wrote an
24:48
article in the Harvard Business Review
24:50
called the well-planned life in which he
24:53
laid out for the as a graduation speech
24:56
to the the Business School graduates how
24:58
he had throughout his life he'd seemed
25:01
good career he'd seen too many students
25:02
who went off to become you know just dug
25:06
into their business and spent 18 hours a
25:09
day working to improve them to get
25:12
promoted and so forth and left their
25:14
family and friends behind and then that
25:17
didn't work out so well for them and so
25:19
he laid out a method that they should
25:21
consider using instead where they plan
25:23
in advance so it sort of lay out a plan
25:25
for how they're gonna balance or a lot
25:27
time to all of these different places
25:29
that are important and it's something
25:31
that he did in his own life so that's
25:33
become known as the well-planned life
25:36
school of thought which makes some sense
25:38
right it's that life is a big project
25:40
what are our goals how are we going to
25:42
get there what metric are going
25:45
we gonna use for success so not too long
25:48
after that David Brooks who is he's now
25:57
he's a New York time columnist on the
25:59
opinion page maybe you've seen stuff by
26:01
him he might be politically a little on
26:02
the conservative side I'm not sure he
26:04
wrote an article called the the of
26:10
course I didn't put it up here because I
26:11
didn't the the summoned life the
26:14
summoned life and that's the approach
26:15
that he thought was better which and
26:17
what he said by that is we shouldn't
26:19
make our life focused around being
26:22
successfully achieving goals instead we
26:26
should think about our life as being an
26:28
experience that we're in in the moment
26:30
and we're gonna do the best with what we
26:32
can and make what we can of it and we'll
26:34
just more of a journey approach where
26:36
you're going through life as a journey
26:37
and success is not determined by
26:39
achieving goals now so those are two
26:44
both of them include the ability to
26:46
achieve goals etc
26:48
but what I'm going to suggest is that
26:50
this is a pretty goal-oriented group in
26:52
this room and you probably think about
26:54
your professional life as only being
26:56
successful if you get XY and z papers
26:58
grants etc etc etc you may have actually
27:02
goals for your for your kids or for your
27:04
family as well that are important goals
27:07
switch achievement goals and maybe it
27:10
would be a good idea to back off of that
27:12
a little bit and think about the
27:13
experience of life sort of day-to-day
27:16
living focusing more on relationships
27:19
rather than goals so I'm just going to
27:21
suggest that you maybe get a little bit
27:24
away from the success this the success
27:27
metric and more toward the journey
27:29
metric I don't know how would you do
27:33
that exactly I think being present just
27:35
practicing being present not display not
27:39
defining I'll only be successful in my
27:40
career if I get this goal meant that's
27:44
your a set up there because you never
27:46
know how things are gonna go doesn't
27:48
mean you can't have goals but you don't
27:50
define your the success of your life by
27:52
these goals now I'm starting to sound
27:54
like the Episcopal preacher from down
27:56
the road who you get the point you can
27:59
look at these and see to what extent
28:00
they might be helpful to you okay now
28:02
this I really like and I really really
28:04
liked it because where I found it was in
28:06
a James Patterson book you know James
28:10
Patterson the most prolific producer of
28:13
books in the history of the world who
28:15
now writes all these books with other
28:17
people so he gets even more because and
28:19
in a book I've not I don't think I've
28:20
read that book Suzanne's diary for
28:22
Nicholas but so I really like this
28:24
metaphor and so I'd like you to think
28:27
about this imagine life is a game in
28:29
which you're juggling five balls work
28:31
family health friends and integrity
28:33
you're keeping all of them the air but
28:35
one day you come to understand that work
28:36
is a rubber ball if you drop it it will
28:39
bounce back the other four balls family
28:42
health friends interior are made of
28:43
glass if you drop one of these it will
28:45
be irrevocably scuffed nicked or even
28:48
shattered so it's it's a nice way to
28:50
think about it isn't it because it's
28:52
true I think and if you want to keep
28:54
this if you want to think of this whole
28:56
life approach so think about that don't
28:59
worry I'm just not going to be right
29:00
reading quotes through this whole thing
29:02
okay now the final point I want to make
29:04
is one that we all recognize but we
29:07
don't always talk about it at least from
29:09
the podium and that is that a lot of the
29:11
challenges that you face in your work as
29:14
academic clinician scientists those of
29:16
you who have that job or even working at
29:18
the University with all of its various
29:20
policies and procedures and
29:22
organizational changes and paperwork and
29:24
so on
29:25
a lot of and and the the policies that
29:29
the university has about when you can go
29:31
and when you have to stay and so forth
29:32
are are an institutional issue the same
29:37
thing is true about burnout there was
29:38
just an article in somewhere and I think
29:42
the Harvard Business Review talking
29:44
about how burnout is really an
29:45
institutional it's the institution's job
29:47
to solve that not individuals these are
29:50
true things you are in a situation in an
29:53
institution that has certain rules and
29:55
regulations and policies that limit what
29:58
you can do personally about achieving
30:00
balance in certain ways that you might
30:01
like to do it and there are all kinds of
30:03
things that you are faced with in your
30:05
work that seem onerous and how should we
30:08
say pain producing and depleting like
30:11
email EMR IRB applications writing
30:16
grants repetitively over and over and
30:17
over with no not much chance all those
30:19
things are true but there are things
30:23
that you can do as a person to work or
30:25
you could their work around you can do
30:27
there are things you can do to take
30:29
control back to that locus of control
30:30
idea so I don't want you to think that I
30:33
don't know that all these things exist
30:35
because I perfectly well know they do
30:37
and you should know they do but you
30:40
can't let that stop you from creating a
30:42
better life okay the sermon is now
30:45
officially ended I'm gonna sit for a
30:47
minute here my and let's see what's next
30:51
ah so now I want to lay out kind of a
30:57
way to assess your situation some
31:00
questions you might ask yourself some
31:02
ways of thinking about if the problem is
31:04
too much to do some general ideas some
31:08
specific ideas that can help reduce
31:10
stress and make you more present and
31:12
balanced
31:13
sometime time allocation methods that
31:15
we've talked about a little bit and
31:17
we'll go over those in this context okay
31:22
and there's lots more that you could
31:24
find if you read about this or think
31:26
about it or talk with friends about it
31:27
there's not one solution here okay so so
31:33
these are the main questions these are
31:35
some questions you could ask yourself
31:37
there may be others for you the idea
31:39
here is instead of just saying oh I have
31:41
poor work-life balance it's to say
31:44
exactly what in my life isn't working
31:46
what pieces of my life are encroaching
31:49
on others where are there is it really
31:53
true that I'm I just don't have time for
31:55
everything are there conflicts in time
31:58
or effort between x and y across all
32:01
these things you do is this a time in
32:04
your life when you really need to be
32:05
focusing more on maybe you have babies
32:08
at home and this is the time you really
32:10
need to that's a big much bigger effort
32:12
than it will be when they're I don't
32:13
know what age it is when they stop being
32:26
or you do get everything done but you're
32:28
just exhausted emotionally and
32:30
physically with or without pain so those
32:34
are kind of where so if you can kind of
32:36
pick out what are the specific things
32:37
that are bothering you is that can
32:39
everybody can everybody think you don't
32:41
have to say you're not going to be asked
32:43
to report these can anybody think of one
32:47
thing in their life that meets one of
32:49
these criteria or some other specific
32:51
conflict that's not so generic
32:57
you might have to think about it a
32:58
little while so one specific example
33:04
would be in my current in my current
33:07
life I have to spend five hours at night
33:10
completing my medical documentation at
33:14
least four days a week and that's
33:16
interesting with numerous things time
33:19
with my kids my family etc that would be
33:22
a specific conflict and do you see how
33:24
identifying that as the problem doesn't
33:27
lead to a magical solution but it gives
33:29
you something concrete that you can
33:30
start to work on rather than just saying
33:32
oh I'm so tired all the time try to
33:34
think about what things seem to be under
33:37
at least partially underneath that now
33:40
if I can't tell whether this concept is
33:42
of a specific assessment is making sense
33:44
or not you could blink your eyes twice
33:47
if it is what do you think
33:56
well let's keep going and unless anyone
33:59
was willing to throw out another example
34:01
besides the EMR that they can think of
34:05
or my life would be perfect if our
34:07
department didn't have meetings at 7
34:09
a.m. two days a week and I had can't
34:11
take my kids to childcare until 8
34:13
o'clock so that would be example of a
34:15
work family conflict
34:17
yeah and once you've identified that as
34:20
a specific problem now you can start
34:21
thinking about is there something I
34:22
could do at the department level is
34:24
there something I could do on the
34:25
getting my kids to preschool level who
34:28
should I talk to can I get some some can
34:34
I can I get an excuse for not going to
34:36
all the meetings there are lots of
34:38
things that you could start it'll start
34:39
to generate more concrete ideas about
34:41
what to do that would that would be a
34:42
good example okay all right now we've
34:47
already talked about how children are a
34:48
special case there there's more trouble
34:50
with children here than our bigger
34:52
challenge for you know all reasons you
34:54
can all think of so we won't say more
34:56
about that now I want to also say
34:59
because in this area we're starting to
35:01
edge into areas of mental health issues
35:05
and burnout and so forth if you think
35:07
you're in a situation that is really
35:09
serious you are exhausted all the time
35:13
emotionally or physically you are
35:15
feeling either depressed or anxiety
35:17
symptoms that are interfering I know you
35:19
know all these things but you don't
35:21
always think to go see somebody about
35:22
them you really have to seek some kind
35:24
of more professional help because this
35:26
help self-help strategies are not going
35:29
to get you out of that so don't hesitate
35:31
to seek help if you if you need it okay
35:37
so let's talk about if you think you
35:38
have too much to do probably everybody
35:40
here thinks I think that's probably a
35:42
pretty generic one so it's a good one to
35:43
start with okay so let's talk a little
35:48
bit about how you could try to
35:49
right-size your current workload which
35:52
means reduce it doesn't necessarily mean
35:55
got that so the first thing that you
35:57
could do you know there are two kind of
36:00
assessment strategies assess how you're
36:02
spending your time and assess what
36:04
you're actually doing that needs time do
36:07
you see that those are two different
36:08
things
36:08
so if
36:10
first I just want to pitch the idea of
36:12
using time tracking as a tool not
36:15
necessarily or something that you would
36:17
do every day I'm not suggesting that you
36:19
would necessarily some people do do it
36:21
every day but I'm not suggesting that
36:23
you do that I'm thinking about doing it
36:25
in a in an assessment mode where you do
36:28
it for a while maybe a week just one
36:32
week and you keep track of everything
36:34
that you do on a time grid so that you
36:37
can see how much time you're spending
36:38
and I do not encourage so the purpose of
36:41
that would be to see whether what you
36:44
say to yourself about I don't have
36:46
enough time to sleep I don't have enough
36:48
time for any personal time I'm spending
36:50
too much time at work if those things
36:52
are really true it turns out that people
36:58
reliably misremember or don't actually
37:02
have a good idea of how they spend their
37:05
time unless they write it down and this
37:07
is true across a whole range of
37:10
activities I used to do PMS work and it
37:14
became clear to early investigators that
37:16
most women who said many women who said
37:18
about half of the women who said my
37:20
symptoms only occur in the in the late
37:23
luteal phase premenstrual half of them
37:25
were wrong about that when you asked
37:27
them to actually keep track of their
37:28
symptoms the symptoms were actually
37:29
happening all the time but there was an
37:31
attributional bias so they believed that
37:33
that that's stuck with them that it was
37:35
occurring at that time so that's just
37:37
one simple example of how people don't
37:42
really remember things very well and you
37:43
there's another person who studies this
37:49
a journalist who studies this and
37:52
there's an institute that does it and
37:53
and they have both come out with data
37:56
suggesting that people who say they only
37:58
get a few hours of sleep actually mow
38:00
this may not be true in this room I
38:01
understand that you're probably more
38:03
attuned to it actually most people do
38:05
get enough sleep they just report that
38:08
they're not getting it because they
38:09
don't actually keep track and they feel
38:11
tired so they say I'm not getting enough
38:13
sleep now I don't know or or I don't
38:15
have time to do anything personal and
38:18
then when you keep track of your time
38:20
you see that you watch chopped for three
38:22
hours last night
38:24
and so I could choose to watch chopped
38:27
or I could say maybe just two episodes
38:30
of chopped would be enough and for one
38:32
of those hours I could do something else
38:34
or maybe the episode I've seen three
38:36
times or more I could skip that one so
38:39
you might think about one way to track
38:42
your time the woman who who is sort of
38:44
the the modern disciple of this in in
38:47
the popular culture is Laura Vander kam
38:49
I'm you're gonna get her a full name and
38:51
a book that she wrote that writes in
38:53
another slide
38:54
she's the journalist who's interested in
38:56
all this she's been tracking her time
38:58
for 12 years every day in an Excel
39:00
spreadsheet and she has five children
39:02
now she said her sixth child oh my god
39:04
she keeps having children and she's a
39:07
freelance she travels all the time and
39:09
her husband travels all the time and
39:10
they balance all these kids and it's
39:12
very interesting but it's the time track
39:15
the time tracking that actually helps
39:16
her get all that done because she can
39:18
see where to make changes so her method
39:21
is to take a grid that's in 30 minutes a
39:24
30 minute I think these are in 15 minute
39:26
increments but you could do 30 and in
39:29
each box you just write down the main
39:30
thing you were doing like email laundry
39:35
clinic and then walk out the time you
39:37
were in clay so you don't have to give a
39:38
lot of detail here you're and then you
39:40
write down when you got up and when you
39:42
go to bed and you'll be amazed actually
39:47
at some of the things that you see so
39:49
you might try that for a week and just
39:51
see and then you can use that for
39:53
example to say well these are my highest
39:55
priorities how much time did I spend
39:56
this week on any of them and you know
39:59
highlight the ones where you did and you
40:01
may find out that most weeks you
40:02
actually don't spend much time on the
40:04
very highest priorities that you have
40:05
and that'll be a message to you that
40:07
something needs to change if you want to
40:09
keep those as priorities and in on her
40:14
website if you go to her website there's
40:16
actually a grid that you can download
40:18
and she and she has some instructions
40:21
that you might want to follow you can
40:22
really do it however you want but I
40:23
think a week of this is a pretty
40:25
valuable technique has anybody ever done
40:27
this what do you think about this idea I
40:29
have firmly resisted at my entire life
40:32
until I finally was convinced to try it
40:35
and I do it in
40:37
special situations where for one day I
40:41
want to see I use it most often on days
40:44
when I have not much to do I have a big
40:47
gap in time those are the days I tend to
40:49
waste the most so I use it and it helps
40:53
me I use it more proactively as a tool
40:55
so if I have a whole free day and I'm at
40:58
the end of the day I've only worked on
41:00
the first sentence of the abstract that
41:01
I started with in the morning that's a
41:03
problem
41:04
so I do a thing where I track my time
41:05
and if I wrote down abstract for eight
41:09
straight hours it would be embarrassing
41:11
so I always forces me to move on so I
41:14
use it as a tool to use my time better
41:16
it's another thing that you can do with
41:18
time tracking and when you do that you
41:20
can just do it intermittently you don't
41:21
have to do it every day but I really
41:22
encourage you unless you to see whether
41:24
you what you firmly believe is true
41:26
about how you spend your time if it's
41:27
really true
41:29
so think about just one week just one
41:32
week all right I got not seeing a lot of
41:35
enthusiasm read Laura's book and you'll
41:37
know okay now the second one is trying
41:42
to assess what you're actually doing and
41:44
this falls prey to the fact that most
41:46
people don't actually keep track in
41:48
writing of what they're doing so it you
41:49
have to if you're going to really do
41:51
this you have to start that way so there
41:53
are two ways you can do this activity
41:54
assessment the first way is the one that
41:56
takes the most time not a lot of time
41:58
but takes more time and you may be at
42:00
risk if you do this for fainting or
42:02
nausea or like headedness because you
42:06
didn't realize of all the things that
42:07
you actually are doing and so you have
42:09
to be a little careful about it I'm
42:10
actually not kidding about that I have
42:11
people telling me that all the time
42:13
so this full inventory of work
42:15
eventually can be a really helpful thing
42:17
where you write down all your list all
42:20
your roles so the roles would be the
42:22
things we saw and that slide back there
42:25
so one would be you're a clinician
42:27
you're the assistant program director do
42:31
you get what I mean you're whatever your
42:35
research role is at home you may be you
42:39
are caring for elderly parents that
42:41
would be a role you have kids that would
42:43
be a role maybe you're the only one that
42:44
cooks that would be a role that you have
42:48
so just think of all the roles that
42:50
occupy
42:51
you're trying make a list of those and
42:52
then for each of them just write down
42:54
what your regular responsibilities are
42:56
like for for how many hours do you spend
42:59
or what are your responsibilities just
43:02
routine things for being the assistant
43:03
program director what do I have to do
43:06
for that on a regular basis and you can
43:07
do that for all your roles and then you
43:09
can also think of what special you know
43:11
project work you're doing the kind of
43:14
clear things that you're working toward
43:15
that are not going to be ongoing but are
43:18
gonna be done like writing a paper or a
43:20
grant or a white paper or curriculum
43:22
revision or a report to the Dean or
43:24
whatever it is that's a project kind of
43:26
thing at home it would be regular
43:28
responsibilities for cooking would be
43:29
shopping cooking cleaning up cleaning
43:33
the refrigerator out periodically and
43:35
the pantry know the pantry and the
43:37
refrigerator would be project work
43:38
because that's just unaccustomed to if
43:47
you haven't ever done that now the
43:50
quicker way to do it which we can
43:52
actually do right this minute if you
43:54
have something you can write on whether
43:56
it's can be done on a computer or a
43:58
phone or whatever is to do the quick
44:01
start method which I kind of like
44:02
actually as a beginning thing anyway
44:04
what you're going to do is is going to
44:06
make give just a rapid intuitive
44:08
response to two questions so the first
44:14
question is so we're gonna do it right
44:16
now
44:16
are you ready what would you like to do
44:18
more of in your life or start doing that
44:22
you're not doing right now the rule here
44:30
is that you're just you're not thinking
44:32
about whether you can actually do it or
44:34
not you're not thinking about whether
44:36
it's feasible you're thinking about what
44:38
would you like to be doing more of does
44:41
that make sense so no limits on this
44:45
I've never met anyone who couldn't come
44:47
up with one thing but some people are
44:49
you know that they're doing what they
44:51
want to be doing they're just not you
44:53
know maybe spending their time the way
44:54
they'd like to did everybody think of
44:56
something how many people wrote exercise
45:00
aha
45:02
so that would be one that would you know
45:03
a lot of people have that one because
45:04
it's hard to work in so you keep that
45:07
list and then now what would you like to
45:11
do less of and here again it does not
45:15
have to be realistic what would you like
45:18
to do less of or potentially stop I'm
45:23
not going to allow you to say stop equal
45:25
email because that would be so
45:28
unrealistic now this list can go on and
45:31
on and on these would be all the pain
45:34
points that you have that leave you
45:35
depleted and that seemed not that
45:37
important to you
45:47
does everybody have something written
45:48
down in this category okay so what you
45:53
can do with this you might want to redo
45:55
it at a time when you have a little bit
45:57
more time but even this this small
45:59
sample is enough to help you kind of
46:02
tune into the things that the really
46:04
important things that you'd like to make
46:05
priorities to change so if you want to
46:08
do it over again later with a little bit
46:10
more time that's fine or just use what
46:11
you have to get started and this allows
46:13
you to focus in on those things right
46:17
away without doing that full inventory
46:19
because intuitively you know what things
46:21
you would really like not to be doing
46:22
you don't need to know that it's 45th
46:25
out of the list of 145 so the strategies
46:30
about when you want to do less we could
46:32
go on and on about these but I just want
46:34
to give you the the the concepts here
46:36
because you can figure some of this
46:39
yourself out or there are books out
46:40
there to help you do that when you only
46:44
have two options when you want to do
46:45
less of something you could either do it
46:47
differently so that it takes up less
46:48
time or you could stop don't do it can
46:52
you think of another option here I can't
46:56
think of one you can't manufacture time
46:58
so this is it stop or do it differently
47:02
now they do it differently category is
47:04
the is really the whole realm of kind of
47:08
traditional time management be more
47:10
efficient reduce the scope lower your
47:15
standards so that you're not aiming for
47:17
perfection so be more efficient we'll
47:19
just go with we'll go with the cooking
47:24
cooking too much you want too much
47:27
cooking to be more efficient you could
47:30
do things like use a pressure cooker
47:35
which would allow you to make things
47:37
faster some things faster I'm kind of a
47:41
pressure cooker fanatic so if you'd like
47:44
to talk about that later why convince
47:46
one guy to buy it pressure cooker I just
47:48
talked to him a few weeks so he said yes
47:49
after your last talk I went out and
47:51
bought a pressure cookers I said
47:52
excellent so you can get instant pots
47:54
now and other electronic versions of
47:56
pressure cookers which of course is not
47:58
what I have because they didn't exist
48:00
I bought my pressure cookers but so
48:01
everybody can be a pressure cooker
48:02
person now or you could use a slow
48:05
cooker would do the same thing right
48:07
you'd be more efficient because it would
48:09
you wouldn't have to be involved in the
48:10
cooking process as much so reducing the
48:12
scope would be serving simple meals
48:19
three times a week and more elaborate
48:20
ones four times a week so cutting down
48:22
on the if you're a real cook you really
48:24
want to make fancy meals more times than
48:26
you have time for so you could just cut
48:27
back on that and say we're gonna do
48:29
simple stuff during the week and I'll do
48:30
fancy stuff on the weekends that'd be an
48:33
idea for that and lowering your
48:35
standards would be if you really well
48:40
Lorient one example of lowering your
48:42
standards would be I'm going to we're
48:45
going to have frozen meals four times a
48:47
week which you can do you can buy
48:50
perfectly decent frozen food that you
48:53
would serve to your family four times a
48:55
week and that would be lowering your
48:57
standards potentially I mean maybe I
48:59
mean if that's not what you normally do
49:01
and so that would have the advantage of
49:03
reducing the amount of this you do so
49:05
those are three ways that you could do
49:07
that and so what you want to do with
49:09
anything that you want to do less of us
49:11
think about what you could do in each of
49:12
these categories it's important to
49:16
recognize that even a little change can
49:19
make a big difference so I was on a
49:22
plane a few years ago with a woman
49:24
sitting next to me I don't normally talk
49:26
on the plane but somehow we got to
49:27
talking and she turned out to be a
49:30
retired ICU nurse who in her retirement
49:33
had taken on the role of working in with
49:37
NGOs around the world experiencing who
49:41
were working in humanitarian disaster
49:43
areas like the sunna original tsunami
49:45
Haiti and so on and so forth so she
49:48
jetted all over the place helping I
49:50
don't know exactly what she did but but
49:52
that's how she spent a lot of her time
49:54
and so we got to talking about time
49:56
management a little bit first she wanted
49:58
me to advise her about the new handbag
49:59
that she should get and I thought it
50:01
said I'm really not an expert on that
50:02
but I'll see what I can find out and
50:04
then she went oh oh oh I have to tell
50:07
you the thing that made the biggest
50:08
difference for me in the last couple of
50:10
years
50:11
I'm kind of excited about this so it
50:13
turns out her husband was still working
50:14
in a job where he had his requirement
50:17
for himself was to have a fresh start
50:20
white shirt to wear to work everyday and
50:26
this woman had been ironing his shirts
50:29
for years along with other irony she did
50:33
all the ironing and she was these shirts
50:34
were just too much and one day it
50:37
occurred to her she could take them to a
50:38
laundry and she said getting rid of
50:41
ironing those shirts has made such a
50:43
huge difference in my life
50:44
now think about here she is going all
50:45
over the country spending a lot of time
50:47
out doing these things and getting rid
50:48
of this one task which she detested her
50:52
words changed her life so don't give up
50:54
if there's some what seems like a small
50:56
thing that you really would like to get
50:58
up rid of or do less up go ahead and do
51:00
it anyway because it can really help
51:02
change your attitude and free up a lot
51:04
of psychic energy that you've been
51:06
wasting on that now to not do it there
51:09
are three options stop doing a delegated
51:13
or outsource it and do it later so on
51:15
the stop side the first thing I'd
51:21
suggest that you do is look to see if
51:23
any there's any low-hanging fruit about
51:25
things you might get rid of so
51:29
activities you've been doing for a long
51:31
time maybe you've been on a committee
51:32
for several years and you believe that
51:36
you have contributed to that committee
51:38
sufficiently and then you realize
51:40
someone else could have the opportunity
51:42
to be on that committee and and learn
51:44
something so maybe it's time for you to
51:45
resign from that committee or that
51:49
activity that you've been on for a long
51:50
time yeah I used to do this periodically
51:52
I'd say what am i doing what have I been
51:54
doing for a really long time even though
51:56
I like it it's time for me to get off of
51:58
it and free up some time typically what
52:04
I always I always had the response from
52:07
people I can't believe you stayed on it
52:08
that long good for good for you now I
52:11
don't know it's not always possible to
52:13
do this maybe your chair wants you to be
52:14
on the committee or you know I'm not
52:16
saying you have to get off of committees
52:17
but it could be that there's some things
52:18
that you do you agree with that
52:59
so I don't know if you have things like
53:01
that that you're dealing with right now
53:02
but there may be other activities that
53:04
you've been doing for a long time at
53:06
home that maybe you don't really want to
53:09
do that you could you could free up time
53:10
and not lose a lot of pleasure go
53:14
through your to-do lists and get rid of
53:19
things that have been on there for a
53:20
long time that you clearly don't seem to
53:21
be too interested in doing and just
53:23
prune some things that event kind of
53:27
aspirational more than anything else and
53:30
just take them off or move them into
53:32
that other ideal list so that they're
53:33
not on your list to see if you don't
53:35
feel more energetic getting rid of
53:37
things that you're not really committed
53:39
to doing and then there are things you
53:41
dislike that you should try really hard
53:44
to stop doing so I was appointed I love
53:46
being on committees and I was on lots of
53:48
them but it went but toward the middle
53:50
of my career I got put on the the laser
53:53
safety subcommittee this was because I
53:57
used a laser into in to treat cervical
54:00
disease warts and dysplasia and so they
54:03
thought they needed a clinician on the
54:04
committee so here I was in this small
54:06
room with six engineers and me and it
54:09
became pretty clear I didn't have much
54:11
to offer to that committee and I
54:13
resigned within I think four months
54:16
which was a all-time record for me so
54:19
anything you dislike and then time
54:21
wasters you know the eighth version the
54:23
the third episode of chopped you've
54:24
watched already there are things you're
54:26
probably doing kind of out of habit or
54:28
their stress relievers but they're not
54:30
really adding anything to your life and
54:32
if you're watching something that really
54:33
relaxes you and helps you feel better
54:35
that's fine
54:35
but sometimes we just kind of fall into
54:37
activities especially at home that we
54:40
could we could divert that time to
54:42
something that we feel it would be feel
54:44
better about doing so that's where the
54:45
time tracking can really help quite a
54:47
bit
54:48
did you have something you wanted so
55:15
Donald do you have anything you do that
55:18
you shouldn't be doing well that was too
55:20
broad a question I think
55:21
oh yeah
55:31
so you can overdo it at me
55:39
yeah and I had a problem like that where
55:45
I felt like every email that came to me
55:47
that was about time management every
55:49
blog I had to read it and pretty soon I
55:51
realized there were certain categories
55:53
that were just useless for me to read
55:54
and so I had drastically reduced the
55:57
amount of time I spend reading reading
55:59
quads
55:59
I read the ones that will be helpful to
56:01
you but not the ones that you know
56:02
really didn't have any no role my vision
56:06
about what I was doing in this area oh
56:09
goodness
56:10
oh so you can see the whole thing okay
56:23
so stopping we've talked about now this
56:29
is another list of things that we may
56:31
have mentioned some of these that are I
56:33
think are really big problems for people
56:36
I would include myself in that group
56:39
these are things that are in your come
56:43
out of your mind
56:44
that tend to dominate your thinking and
56:46
have generally negative impacts so the
56:50
first one which is something I call
56:53
dream work is work that you things that
56:56
you have thought of that you would like
56:58
to do in your career but really this
57:01
isn't the time to do them or you're not
57:03
sure so that you you're trying to work
57:05
on current stuff and instead this oh but
57:07
I could be right oh I could be writing a
57:08
grant on this and then you spend time
57:10
thinking about it so that dream work can
57:12
come - can overcome your ability to
57:15
focus on your real work so what you want
57:17
to do there is put that in a different
57:19
write it down someplace and set it aside
57:21
and don't think about it in that way
57:23
scope creep is a big one so I was once
57:27
assigned to write to revise a little
57:30
like I don't know two pages in a in a
57:34
American College of ob-gyn I was I
57:39
wasn't even going to be the author I was
57:41
just gonna be the reviser of the one
57:43
that the first person wrote which is a
57:45
painful process let me tell you so don't
57:46
ever agree to do that but I said to
57:49
myself I thought about a little bit then
57:51
I started I thought I'm gonna
57:52
this the best two pages on this topic in
57:55
the history of obstetrics and gynecology
57:58
well that was a stupid thing to think
57:59
because that wasn't the point all I had
58:01
to do is get the references updated
58:02
make sure there were no inaccuracies and
58:04
add if there was anything new that had
58:06
been come along so I do that all the
58:08
time scope creep is a big problem for me
58:10
where I'm set to do something that
58:12
someone's asking me to do all right and
58:13
eventually it the project just grows and
58:15
grows and grows in a way that it doesn't
58:18
have to it would be perfectly fine to
58:20
stop here where I'm supposed to be
58:21
instead I want to make it bigger so pay
58:23
attention to whether you are prone to
58:25
scroll sculpt creep on anything
58:28
housekeeping writing I don't care what
58:30
it is
58:32
there's a lot been written recently
58:35
under the psychology literature about
58:37
the effect that having regrets and
58:40
ruminating about them can have on your
58:43
on your emotional health and I'm not one
58:47
to I can't that's not my area of
58:51
expertise to help you stop ruminating
58:53
but I do have a couple of references
58:55
that maybe I'll add into this slide
58:58
where you can go read some ideas about
59:00
how to do this but these can be really
59:02
damaging because it's one of those
59:04
things you're worrying about something
59:05
that you can't change for the most part
59:10
and the ruminating just takes your mind
59:13
off of any positive energy that you
59:15
might have and then I suppose along
59:20
those same lines these last two kind of
59:22
fit with the above topics if you have a
59:24
goal that actually doesn't work for you
59:26
anymore you should rethink that goal and
59:28
either modify it to meet what the real
59:31
goal what your better goal would be or
59:33
get rid of it so we sometimes get the
59:35
idea as we're going through our early
59:37
career that the only way to make
59:39
progress is to pick a goal and stick
59:41
with it no matter what and perseverance
59:43
is what will get you you know make you
59:44
successful but that's not really the way
59:46
it works you pick a goal so that you
59:48
have direction and you start out and
59:50
then as you go and work and do things
59:52
you discover how to refine that goal or
59:55
maybe even change the direction of it
59:57
that's not failure that's doing things
60:00
in a sensible way that will lead to more
60:02
career satisfaction
60:04
and success and then you want to also of
60:08
course eliminate any if you have to
60:10
modify your goal if you decide to the
60:12
feeling that you failed it's not a very
60:13
useful way to think about so all of
60:16
these things can can can dominate your
60:18
thinking in a way that really detracts
60:21
from your ability to enjoy your current
60:23
life and move forward now outsourcing
60:27
and delegating this is a hard one this
60:30
is a really personal my guess is that
60:33
many people in the room don't have a lot
60:35
of opportunities to delegate at work
60:37
unless you have a staff that you can
60:39
delegate things to and outsourcing it is
60:43
a perfect is an excellent idea but it
60:45
does cost money and so that's not always
60:46
practical I'm thinking of things about
60:48
like a house really you know personal
60:52
life
60:52
related things the snow you don't have
60:55
snow removal here do you you wait for
60:56
the Sun is what I heard so in Iowa we
60:59
have snow removal yard maintenance
61:02
shopping you could have somebody do your
61:03
grocery shopping for you the grocery
61:05
store will do it and deliver it so what
61:08
what do you what do you think about the
61:09
deli in particular the this this concept
61:12
of having somebody else do something
61:14
that has heretofore been your
61:15
responsibility does anybody here have
61:18
any I mean there are obstacles for
61:20
people as they think about this but does
61:22
anybody in this one want to throw out
61:23
something that some something about
61:26
giving work away that's a problem makes
61:29
it hard to do yeah
62:17
so I think the housekeeping thing is the
62:19
thing that a lot of people have trouble
62:21
with as opposed to having somebody rake
62:26
your lawn or you know things that seem
62:30
more okay to do so does anybody I don't
62:36
really want to ask how many people
62:37
actually use have somebody occasionally
62:39
come to clean their house I mean I will
62:42
say I do yeah do how many okay I'll ask
62:45
okay oh so oh so it looks like this is
62:49
not a problem for most of you good I'm
62:52
glad to hear because I've heard a lot of
62:53
especially early early career women say
62:56
I just couldn't do that it costs money
62:58
and they wouldn't meet my standards
63:01
lower your standards okay yeah
63:44
so I will just say that on one of the
63:47
articles I wrote on the website is about
63:49
delegation and and it goes into more
63:51
detail about how to think about that so
63:53
that you'll become enthusiastic about it
63:56
I think sometimes it's hard when you've
63:58
never worked with an assistant before
64:00
and you only have a small amount of
64:01
somebody's time to know what you should
64:04
do with that so I always think that it's
64:06
reasonable either to talk to somebody
64:08
more senior who uses that person or talk
64:10
directly to the person and say what are
64:12
the things that you do that you know
64:14
that I could ask you to do if the person
64:17
is someone that you think you could ask
64:18
that out because they that's their
64:20
that's what they're dare to do and I
64:22
know some assistants get really annoyed
64:25
when someone walks over to the copy
64:27
machine now that's not everybody I don't
64:29
want to say that that's true but try to
64:30
find out what what what assistance you
64:32
could get if it's not obvious anything
64:38
else about this topic okay the reception
64:41
isn't till 4:00 but we can have a little
64:42
break before that if okay and then the
64:46
later thing is the idea of sequencing
64:48
things and the idea of having a place
64:51
where you can record stuff that you you
64:53
don't you really you're not gonna do it
64:55
now you're gonna give up quilting for
64:56
the time being and come back to it a
64:58
year later for example or you're not
65:00
gonna take it up right now you're gonna
65:01
wait you can do this both with
65:03
professional project work or new roles
65:06
or things in your personal life that
65:09
you'd like to that you think you'd be
65:10
interested in so you can just have a
65:12
place where you record all that stuff or
65:14
you can put things on your calendar that
65:16
you want to bring back into your life at
65:17
a particular time I think we talked
65:19
about this in the first session this
65:21
afternoon a little bit but keeping track
65:23
of those things is important because
65:24
otherwise they'll just bug you if you're
65:27
not doing them now what if you want to
65:31
add something now what I mean by that
65:35
what if you want to what if you want to
65:37
add something that you really would
65:40
really like to do so I'm talking about
65:42
like maybe one thing you are just
65:43
passionate about you would really like
65:45
to you would really like to start doing
65:47
more action
65:47
you really would or you would really
65:50
like to take up a hobby or you would
65:52
really like to do more more writing of
65:54
some kind there's something you would
65:55
really like to figure out how to do more
65:57
of there there are two ways that you can
66:03
go about this one of them is to look at
66:07
your do some time tracking some
66:09
allocation and looking at all the things
66:10
you do cut some things out and create
66:12
some create some time to start doing I
66:15
think it rare that rarely works because
66:18
it's hard to do all those things and
66:20
your better bet would just be to say I'm
66:23
gonna start doing this now no matter
66:24
what I'm gonna start doing it maybe at a
66:26
really small level I'm going to
66:28
experiment with different ways to do it
66:30
so I can start fitting it in when I know
66:32
I can't say I was enthusiastic about
66:34
exercising but I knew I needed to do it
66:35
so what ideas I signed up for a trainer
66:38
twice a week trainer and there it was on
66:41
my calendar I was paying money for it I
66:42
had to go and so that's how I got
66:44
started doing that I just decided even
66:45
though I don't feel like I have time I'm
66:47
gonna do it anyway and there is
66:49
something about adding something like
66:52
that into your life which creates the
66:56
time it needs because other things
66:58
aren't so important to you and you'll
66:59
start to figure out how to do less of
67:03
them or do them more efficiently so this
67:04
is Laura Vander kam the woman I was
67:06
telling you about who the book that I'd
67:08
recommend if you she's written several
67:09
books the one book I would recommend
67:12
that you look at is I know how she does
67:14
it how successful women make the most of
67:16
their time it's a study she did of a
67:18
hundred women who were defined as
67:20
successful by making more than hundred
67:21
thousand dollars a year and had children
67:23
at home
67:23
that's just she had to just have a
67:25
definition there are several physicians
67:26
in the sample and she had them two time
67:29
logs for a week and then she analyzed
67:31
the time logs and discovered the ways in
67:33
which these women managed to get more
67:35
done than the most people do it works
67:38
for men too it's not she just happened
67:39
to study women I think that's her
67:41
primary audience probably but the
67:43
techniques that she came up with are
67:46
important ones and at the beginning of
67:48
that book she has what I think is a
67:49
really an idea that really supports what
67:54
I just said you don't build the life you
67:56
want by saving time you build the life
67:59
you want by doing the things that you
68:01
want to be
68:01
doing and then time saves itself
68:04
recognizing that's what makes success
68:07
possible so the people that you know who
68:09
get a lot of writing done despite being
68:11
active clinicians they really want to
68:13
write they really want to write and so
68:15
they figure out I'm not saying that if
68:17
you don't really want to write if you're
68:19
not doing that but typically they will
68:20
just say this is important enough to me
68:22
that I'm gonna figure out how to do it
68:23
no matter what you can only do that with
68:25
about one thing at a time but I just
68:27
want you to keep that dynamic in mind so
68:31
that you're not putting off doing
68:32
something important to you just because
68:34
it doesn't seem that there's a month
68:35
enough time okay you need to choose your
68:39
new work more carefully and you give an
68:41
example of that sue and you said with
68:42
the committee to to ask yourself is this
68:44
something that's going to be valuable to
68:46
me am I gonna make it am I gonna be able
68:47
to make a contribution will I meet
68:49
people that I wouldn't otherwise meet
68:50
and have to expand my network in the
68:52
institution these are the six categories
68:55
that I usually personally think about
68:57
when something new comes up I'm asked to
69:01
do something new or think about
69:02
something the first question is is this
69:03
part of my job now that would seem like
69:06
a no-brainer but for me I often have
69:10
things that I'm supposed to do in my I'm
69:12
putting off and then one day I realize
69:14
you know what this is part of my job I'm
69:17
being paid to do this so I'd better get
69:19
on the stick and do it so ask yourself
69:21
if what you're being asked to do is part
69:23
of your job now you might if you have a
69:26
boss that you can negotiate with you
69:29
might be able to negotiate some things
69:30
away by trading or doing something else
69:32
but if it's part of your job then you
69:34
sort of are going to be doing that the
69:37
second one is is this something that I
69:40
have already promised somebody that I
69:42
would do and this is more about work
69:44
that you've already added in rather than
69:46
new stuff but but it relates to new
69:48
stuff in that I think a useful way to
69:53
think about promises that you've made is
69:54
that those are moral contracts with
69:56
other people and if you break the
69:58
promise by being late or not doing it at
70:00
all you have breached your integrity is
70:04
breached and eventually your true
70:06
people's trust and you will go down and
70:08
I've seen people whose academic careers
70:10
have been damaged by failure to follow
70:12
through on things they promise I'm not
70:13
just sure none
70:14
you do that but it can happen and so
70:17
this dynamic should help you to think
70:20
carefully about promising a big thing to
70:23
somebody before you've decided that you
70:25
can do it so don't just promise to do
70:27
something unless you've thought through
70:27
the likelihood that you can actually
70:29
follow through and what you've said you
70:31
will do because then you have a great
70:33
response to the ask you can say you know
70:36
this does sound interesting but I cannot
70:38
I don't have the capacity right now to
70:42
be able to do that job the way it needs
70:43
to be done and that's the answer does it
70:48
work for everything it doesn't work with
70:50
everybody but that's a way to think
70:51
about those things
70:53
there these are two tricky ones what
70:57
you're being what you're thinking about
70:58
doing or taking on is related to an
71:00
important goal that you have here the
71:03
problem is not that you agree to do it
71:05
but that you agree to do too many of
71:07
these things at one time so you end up
71:09
with a whole batch of things and you
71:11
can't really devote appropriate time to
71:13
any of them so you have to think about
71:15
staging making sure you're not over
71:18
committing so that you actually get the
71:20
value out of the things you are doing
71:21
and maybe putting some things off for
71:24
later if you can do that now the
71:26
interesting fun and satisfying things
71:28
you might say would be an easy cut but
71:30
hopefully in this session we understand
71:33
that that's not a good idea that you
71:34
have to keep you do need to keep things
71:36
like it's important to keep things like
71:37
that in your life so again just not too
71:40
many to fill up more time than they can
71:41
occupy and then the final two are ones
71:44
that maybe I'm the only person who's
71:45
ever run into these well the first one
71:48
I'm sure not so if you ever been like in
71:50
a in a division meeting or or a group
71:52
and where the the leader of the group
71:55
says we need somebody to cover clinic
71:56
next Wednesday morning for somebody
72:00
who's out and there's silence and pretty
72:04
soon in you Wells up this feeling I
72:07
should nobody's gonna do it I'm just
72:10
sure of it it has to be done have you
72:12
ever had have you ever known anybody
72:14
that has that feeling and so if you're
72:17
somebody who has that happen to you a
72:18
lot you need to kind of re-evaluate that
72:20
feeling and be careful about just
72:22
jumping in just because you're having
72:24
the feeling it may be somebody else's
72:25
time to volunteer there'll be another
72:27
arranged
72:28
made in the end you may end up doing it
72:30
but at least not by just giving in so
72:32
easily I'm all for volunteering believe
72:35
me but you can't be always the one that
72:37
volunteers so think that through and
72:39
then the final one this may be only me
72:41
this is the I'm the only one so you're
72:44
called this happened I remember the
72:45
first time big time the the memorable
72:47
time when this happened somebody called
72:49
me an editor of something and would I
72:51
edit a monograph on X Y or Z and it was
72:54
a topic that was not quite on point for
72:57
me and he said oh this is such an
72:58
important monograph and oh you'll be
73:00
it'll be you'll it'll enhance your
73:03
reputation bla bla bla and I felt
73:05
another feeling coming up coming up in
73:07
me where my eye was swelling up with ego
73:10
ah I have to do this because I'm the
73:13
only one he said so I was probably the
73:15
14th people the person he'd called
73:16
so whenever you feel that feeling of ego
73:21
that says do it do it do it you really
73:23
have to be careful about that because it
73:26
is so easy to get off course and pick
73:28
something that is not for you and you'll
73:32
regret every minute of it so I would
73:33
always take those I would never agree to
73:35
something like that right away I would
73:37
say thank you very much I may have some
73:39
other questions and then I'll get back
73:40
to you for those and then I'll let you
73:43
know within a reasonable timeframe
73:45
has anybody else in the room ever had
73:47
that happen to them it's a terrible
73:50
thing when it when when you realize what
73:52
you've done years
74:11
there we go yeah yeah so that's what she
74:19
wants me she wants me she likes ya so
74:23
absolutely so it can happen those little
74:25
things but it's a it's a mistake to do
74:26
it because you're not really committed
74:28
you'll you'll be in pain when you're
74:30
doing it okay
74:32
and then of course that leads to the the
74:34
no question which is a huge question a
74:36
lot of people some people easily say no
74:39
sometimes they say it too often but
74:42
sometimes say when it's time to say no
74:45
they they don't have any problem doing
74:46
it and other people have a really hard
74:48
time saying no I would say I probably
74:52
fall more I used to always fall into
74:54
that category I'm better at it now but
74:56
it's still always kind of hard for me to
74:57
do because I'm thinking about the other
74:59
person and the other the other thing so
75:01
we could have a whole seminar on this
75:03
but we're not you'll be happy to know I
75:06
we're not going to go through all these
75:08
right now but these are some ideas that
75:10
I think are pretty common ideas about
75:12
how to approach a situation where you
75:13
have decided that this thing you're
75:15
being asked to do does not fit in any
75:18
way with your time your time frame your
75:22
your interests you don't have anything
75:27
to contribute much to contribute all
75:29
those different reasons you've made a
75:30
solid decision that this isn't for you
75:32
it'll pull you away from working on your
75:34
own goals because it's so time consuming
75:36
I think the one that I want to point out
75:38
here is a real for some people is a
75:42
really key thing some people have them
75:46
just have that internal feeling that
75:48
they're responsible and that it's
75:51
selfish to say no it's selfish to say no
75:55
so of course the comeback to that which
75:58
you just have to let soak in is if
76:02
you're always saying yes to other people
76:04
you're by fault to saying no to your own
76:06
goals
76:08
if you always say yes to other people
76:10
then you're saying no to spending that
76:13
time on your own
76:14
and it isn't that those other things are
76:16
sometimes important but you don't want
76:18
to go overboard and I love this last one
76:23
which a friend of mine who's up
76:26
vice-provost said this was his approach
76:29
he said I just say I'm not available
76:32
this would be for like events so it'd be
76:34
like your your your talks after your
76:38
friend I'm just not available and he
76:40
said in my head the end of the sentence
76:41
is to do that so this leads to the point
76:46
that for people that you don't need to
76:47
maintain an ongoing relationship with
76:49
you don't have to tell them why you're
76:50
saying no you just say I'm not really
76:52
don't have the capacity to do that but
76:54
thank you very much so don't don't get
76:57
caught up in thinking you have to
76:58
satisfy people that really in the long
77:02
run aren't that important to you anybody
77:05
want to have anything yeah
77:20
[Music]
77:25
I absolutely agree with that it's a Miss
77:59
I mean sometimes you'll read advice that
78:01
you should say no unless you can think
78:03
of a really good reason to do I mean
78:04
that you have to have like you should
78:06
say no to everything your first couple
78:09
of years I just think that's a mistake I
78:11
think you have to be careful about it
78:13
make sure that the things are gonna
78:15
there's going to be value for you in
78:16
some way whether it's meeting people
78:18
learning a new skill getting involved in
78:21
a project that you might be interested
78:23
in pursuing yourself someday getting
78:27
just experience in the institution and
78:28
being known there are lots of there are
78:30
lots of good reasons to say yes but you
78:32
don't want to overdo it
78:33
I personally what
78:45
immediately proposed having open in a
78:48
conversation and mentors and mentees
78:50
separate it is important that first year
78:53
of employment is what exploring and so
78:56
look at our website about the right so
78:58
there's exploration and it's really
79:01
interesting to sit with the new faculty
79:04
in Europe where that leads them but it
79:06
really is about getting to know people
79:08
and so I met with a new faculty member
79:11
of UNESCO
79:23
[Music]
79:43
explore without deep commitments but
79:46
really about learning and contributing
79:48
what you have to contribute as a new
79:49
member of the faculty so this is as you
79:51
can see a kind of a hard one and it's
79:53
important I think if you're getting
79:55
asked to do something you're not sure
79:56
about is to consult with if you have a
79:58
mentor or a senior person that you can
80:01
find out whether you know what they
80:02
think about how valuable this will be
80:04
for you so you don't say no when maybe
80:07
you should be saying yes and and so
80:09
forth okay I let's see okay okay so
80:18
these are just some some isolated ideas
80:22
that I think are helpful the first one
80:24
that koto is a is a method when you feel
80:30
acutely over overwhelmed and that's the
80:33
feeling when you you look around you and
80:35
you just can't think what to do because
80:36
you feel so overwhelmed by everything
80:38
you have to you're just paralyzed now
80:40
this if this is your constant state
80:42
that's a bigger problem but it happens
80:44
to everybody everyone so well so my
80:46
suggestions are in line with what other
80:47
people recommend the emergency treatment
80:50
is to get back in the moment and stop
80:52
thinking about the outside and just get
80:54
back right in your current space so you
80:57
want to stop and take a deep breath
80:58
these will be cotton you'll these will
81:00
make sense to you you want to slow down
81:02
instead of speed up usually people start
81:04
to act frantically and that's a big
81:06
mistake so you want to just slow down
81:08
and make a quick list of everything that
81:11
seems to be on your mind that you're
81:13
feeling you're being overwhelmed what
81:15
with just take a few minutes and just
81:17
jot down whatever comes to mind that
81:18
feels overwhelming and then pick any
81:21
task any task that you know you have to
81:25
do no matter how tiny and
81:26
do it so that all of those things bring
81:31
you down into the present moment and if
81:33
you do and then you might need to do
81:34
another task and then another one and
81:35
pretty soon you'll calm down and you'll
81:37
be able to to figure out what bigger
81:40
thing you might want to work on so
81:42
having a method to use when that happens
81:44
so you don't flail around all day I
81:46
think it's a good idea one of the are
81:48
the first article in my thing is is this
81:50
is the the code Oh article so it's
81:52
written out in a little bit more detail
81:56
you know this is the idea of getting
81:58
everything out of your head in analyst'
82:00
so we're gonna skip it how many people
82:03
so one of the big ideas that's kind of a
82:05
it's not a fad but a commonly written
82:07
about time management technique now is
82:09
journaling journaling is very big and
82:13
we're so does anybody here you have any
82:16
kind of journaling practice just out of
82:17
curiosity okay so there are lots of
82:21
different kinds of journaling methods
82:23
that you can use but one that I think
82:26
can be can be really helpful because
82:29
it's it's confined to first thing in the
82:32
day sometime early in the day and then
82:33
you don't think about it anymore it's
82:35
called morning notes are you familiar
82:37
with that concept so you are is that
82:40
right so morning notes is a term that
82:42
was invented by Julia Cameron who's a an
82:44
artist I think and writer in her book
82:47
the artists way thank you so much back
82:53
in the 80s
82:54
it's a pretty old book yeah yeah so the
82:58
method that she this is a method that
82:59
she describes in this book that she uses
83:01
everyday to increase her creativity and
83:03
you can actually expand this to do more
83:06
than creativity so the so you sit down
83:08
with she would say a notebook or a piece
83:11
of paper and you would set a timer for
83:13
say 10 or 12 or 15 minutes and you would
83:15
just write whatever comes to mind about
83:18
anything that comes up and then when the
83:21
timer goes off you're done you can do it
83:23
with a typewriter it on a laptop I know
83:26
there may be some advantages to hand
83:27
writing but I can't read mine so they
83:29
would be useless at that point and when
83:31
I find the kinds of things that pop up
83:33
for me when I'm doing that writing are
83:36
things that that I forgot had forgotten
83:39
about that really need to be
83:40
somehow our under in my subconscious pop
83:43
up I think of solutions to problems that
83:45
I've been working on I have idea flashes
83:48
about things I might write about or and
83:51
sometimes that'll take me into making a
83:53
little plan for something that I've been
83:54
thinking about for a long time
83:56
it's amazing what you come up with and
83:58
you just feel kind of settled going into
84:00
the day you can do other kinds of
84:03
journaling at other kinds of day to
84:06
other commonly written about options or
84:10
to do a daily debrief at the end of the
84:12
day so at the end of the day saying what
84:15
went well today what this is the one
84:18
that tell us about your notebook you use
84:21
the debriefing don't you no no you don't
84:24
want to talk about it didn't you tell me
84:27
about the notebook you're using right
84:28
now the planning notebook oh Michael did
84:33
oh I'm so sorry so it doesn't really
84:35
mean I thought I apologize I thought it
84:37
was you um so at the end of the day
84:40
before you go home or at the end of the
84:42
day before you go to bed at night you
84:42
just write down what went well today
84:44
and what what could I improve on it can
84:49
be two sentences you could do a
84:51
gratitude journal which is a really
84:53
great idea because again there's some
84:55
evidence that paying attention during
84:56
the day to good things that happen that
84:58
you're grateful for can change your your
85:01
your view of how the day is going so you
85:03
might just have a notebook and when
85:04
something happens you're grateful for
85:06
you just write it down and the time it
85:08
stick it in your pocket that could
85:09
include things like a patient says to
85:11
you you know what you did for me was
85:12
really helpful and we tend to kind of
85:14
overlook those things and just move on
85:15
if you write that down you'll realize
85:18
that's a good thing that you can be
85:19
grateful that you were able to help that
85:25
patient or something unexpected good
85:28
happens and make a note of it that can
85:31
be something that can improve your
85:32
outlook on life and keep you on a more
85:34
positive band and then there are other
85:36
kinds of journals that that you can go
85:38
online and just read about benefits of
85:40
journaling and find different methods
85:42
and then this is one that the idea came
85:47
from a paper that Susan Pollard wrote
85:52
but as I understand that this was a
85:54
conclusion from a literature review you
85:56
didn't Ecklie forward survey for many
86:08
years this was data from oh okay from
86:12
the faculty forward survey and what we
86:14
did is we we you know we knew that there
86:17
was the outcome that that survey really
86:20
really looks at is attrition how many
86:22
folks leave institutions and so the
86:24
outcome this study was looking at was
86:26
were there predictors of whether people
86:29
were going to leave their position or
86:31
not and we thought that what we would
86:33
find is looking at clinical efforts
86:37
specifically ATS
86:38
there were there there was going to be a
86:39
point some tipping point on the amount
86:42
of time people spend in their clinical
86:44
effort because it was focused on
86:46
clinical faculty that led them to say
86:48
I'm leaving my institution and so we did
86:51
this analysis looking at we had time
86:53
spent in clinical effort by decile and
86:55
at 10% 20% 30% for the same percent of
86:59
the respondents said they were going to
87:01
leave their position but we also asked
87:03
everybody how they felt about the amount
87:05
of time they spent in each of the
87:07
mission areas so in a research clinical
87:09
education administrative and it was the
87:12
it was the people who said they were
87:13
spending either most too much time or
87:16
too little in those mission areas who
87:18
were most likely to leave so if you only
87:20
felt you were out of balance in one
87:22
mission area you know maybe 5% they were
87:25
leaving but by the time you got to folks
87:26
saying that they were 4 4 of the
87:29
missionaries were out all of them were
87:30
out of a line you know a third or more
87:33
weren't planning to leave their job in
87:34
the next one to two years so the point
87:36
being really it and one of the
87:39
conclusions was when you do the annual
87:40
review if you're a supervisor talking to
87:43
your supervisor about how are you
87:45
spending time as are the things you'd
87:46
like to do more or less of even if you
87:48
can't change it right away having that
87:50
conversation and moving towards spending
87:52
your time differently may be protective
87:54
and take chanta belts who's done really
87:57
that been the lead and all the work
87:58
around burnout who was at mayo now is at
88:00
stanford they did a study that really
88:03
looked at what is it
88:04
the amount of time that you that that
88:06
there's a second or the twenty four
88:07
twenty percent of your time to do on the
88:08
thing you love the most is protective
88:10
that Bernice remember that's one day a
88:11
week and so if you think of one day a
88:15
week can mitigate four days of things
88:16
that maybe you're not so enthusiastic
88:17
about it's actually may be a fairly
88:19
small change that you need to make to
88:21
make some difference now you know what
88:25
we I'm just gonna go through this really
88:27
fast this is the weekly planning method
88:29
that I talked about in the last session
88:30
but just to make sure you get the idea
88:32
so to do this you would make a grid of
88:34
the week and then first you would X X
88:38
out all of the time that's committed to
88:40
do things with other people meetings
88:41
clinic etc you could just print out a
88:43
copy of your Outlook calendar and that
88:45
might be sufficient to cover for that
88:47
then what you do is you add in you gray
88:49
out time that you spend in activities of
88:51
daily living which is not the official
88:52
definition but eating commuting cooking
88:55
dinner at night the things that you do
88:56
everyday that don't normally make it
88:58
onto a calendar block out all that time
89:00
and what that does is tell you then how
89:03
much discretionary time you have to do
89:06
everything else how much time is not
89:07
scheduled or planned and then the next
89:11
thing I'd suggest that you do is instead
89:13
of going right to work and and stuff is
89:15
to plan in the personal family social
89:20
time make some plans for how you might
89:22
do things in that area this week and
89:25
then the rest of the time is what's
89:27
available for you to do your work and so
89:29
there are three options that we have
89:32
here to to reduce stress level and
89:39
improve your outlook here one is well we
89:42
talked about in the first session was
89:45
about setting boundaries about when
89:46
you're gonna work during the week so
89:47
that red line means I'm going to work
89:49
here during the week I'm going to work
89:50
during your my week out work hours and
89:52
I'm gonna work that night and I don't
89:54
plan to work any other time I'm gonna
89:56
tell my family this is when I'm working
89:58
and I'm not going to work because it's
89:59
not working at home that's stressful
90:01
it's when it when it seeps into your
90:04
personal life that it's a problem so
90:06
that's one idea
90:08
a second one is let me see if I know
90:13
okay uh-oh here we go
90:15
I press the button too soon darn
90:17
okay so and and in that that work
90:22
boundary business an important one is if
90:24
you're somebody that tends to linger at
90:26
night at the office none of you may do
90:29
that but if you do you find yourself
90:30
there too late
90:31
try setting a time to go home at least
90:34
to begin with one day a week and just
90:37
say no matter what has no matter what
90:39
I'm gonna go home at that time barring
90:42
an actual emergency because what what
90:44
you people tend to linger around
90:46
thinking that they're getting work done
90:47
but at a certain point there's no
90:49
marginal benefit to spending further
90:50
time and you'd be better off going home
90:52
taking some time off and coming back
90:54
with renewed vigor the next day so start
90:57
with one day and see if you can do that
91:00
and then and then the other one is a
91:02
concept that's been studied again by a
91:04
professor at Harvard Business School
91:06
Lisa Pirlo about a concept called that
91:09
she calls planned time off so she
91:12
doesn't study with a bunch of
91:13
consultants consulting teams and the
91:16
study was that each member of the team
91:18
got to pick one week night to Monday
91:20
through Friday when they would be done
91:23
at 5:30 and then they would were not
91:25
allowed to do anything related to work
91:26
until the next morning at 8 o'clock no
91:29
phone calls no email no nothing they
91:32
were forbidden from doing anything they
91:34
had to tell their families in advance
91:35
that this was going to be their time so
91:38
that they could plan things and it was
91:40
really hard to get people to do it they
91:41
had to figure out all kinds of things
91:43
about coverage and so forth but the
91:45
essence of this was when people did this
91:47
regularly it improved the quality of
91:49
their work and their life outside of
91:52
work
91:52
all across the board because they have
91:54
that time to themselves and their and
91:56
and others during that one night a week
91:58
so you you might think about whether
92:01
there's some way you in most weeks you
92:03
could pick one night when you don't plan
92:05
to do any work you may already do that
92:07
but if you're not doing that I'd advise
92:10
you to think about it and then remember
92:11
that it includes email no checking email
92:16
ok now this part will just take a couple
92:20
minutes this is this is pretty basic
92:21
stuff but just as a reminder about
92:23
energy which is one of the important
92:26
elements of so I like this grid
92:30
that lays out four different quadrants
92:34
it's based on energy and emotions
92:37
negative emotions positive ones high
92:39
energy low so that's the quadrant and
92:41
the labels that this guy gave to these
92:45
grids were this is when you're
92:46
performing at your peak this is time
92:49
when you have high positive emotions but
92:51
low energy you recover you do recovery
92:54
activities and then this is when you are
92:56
stuck in a high energy but negative
92:58
emotion you're kind of tired but you
93:01
have to keep going because what you're
93:02
doing is so important it's survival mode
93:04
you've all been in survival mode when
93:05
you're on call or when something goes
93:07
way longer clinically than you think
93:09
it's going to
93:09
so that's survival mode and when you
93:11
start persistently having negative
93:13
emotions and low energy that's when you
93:15
have to be concerned that burnout might
93:17
be on the way so that's a kind of a nice
93:18
way to think about where you fit on this
93:21
grid most days kind of pea 10 you can
93:24
journal every day where yeah how much
93:27
did you spend on the two the two
93:29
elements of the performing side how much
93:31
time did you spend recovering so the the
93:36
you you probably by now know kind of the
93:39
the warning signs of burnout kind of a
93:42
Teague loss of interest detachment from
93:44
patients cynicism about whether what
93:46
you're doing is meaningful in patients
93:48
so those are kind of the symptoms that
93:49
lead to burnout which you can't help
93:51
with self-help methods you have to get
93:53
professional help for that
93:54
so what you're trying to do here is so
93:59
the ideal model here would be that you
94:02
spend most of your time in this in these
94:05
two quadrants you're performing then you
94:07
recover you're performing this is how
94:09
high and elite athletes work right they
94:12
perform perform practice and then they
94:13
take time off to recover because they
94:15
know if they don't recover they can't
94:16
perform at a high level so that's that
94:18
and recognize that in your job you're
94:21
going to occasionally be in survival
94:23
mode but you can't be there all the time
94:25
so if that's happening you need to
94:27
figure it out so that you don't end up
94:28
in this last quadrant I think the
94:31
importance of sleep by now is perfectly
94:33
clear what I wanted to show you here is
94:37
just a little bit of this is my
94:39
hand-drawn summary of the literature
94:42
from an article that I read about
94:44
the studies that have been done you like
94:45
it so here we have the entire week 168
94:49
hours and here we have a measure of
94:51
productivity for whatever it is you do
94:53
it turns out that for most in most
94:55
professions when you get up into the 60
94:57
to 70 hour hours per week you you start
95:03
you're kind of at the apex of the amount
95:06
of productivity you get per unit of time
95:08
and after that you have a it declines
95:11
the marginal benefit of spending more
95:13
time goes down and that's the reason why
95:16
you have to sleep and take time office
95:18
so you can get revved back up again so
95:20
this idea that it working 90 hours a
95:22
week is actually good for you over the
95:24
long run it's probably not true unless
95:26
the work is something that energizes you
95:28
and that doesn't and that's how your
95:30
life is organized and you're happy with
95:31
that but just hanging around and working
95:34
because you feel like you've got stuff
95:36
to do is not it's better to take time
95:39
off and sleep and then come back and I
95:43
think okay let's okay well this is our
95:48
last slide so this was can you tell this
95:51
was hand drawn also did you know could
95:54
you tell right away so here is one of
95:56
those Zen koans those Zen stories so we
95:59
have a sin monk who's walking through
96:03
the woods doing walking meditation and
96:07
all of a sudden a tiger appears behind
96:09
him and so the tiger starts chasing him
96:12
so the monk sensibly starts running
96:14
instead of walking and then comes to the
96:16
edge of a cliff below which 50 feet
96:20
below is a raging river with rocks so
96:25
the only thing that monk can think of -
96:28
he does strength training - in his off
96:29
time he hangs over the cliff with his
96:33
arm there and now he's got the Tiger
96:35
coming at him at one end and the raging
96:38
river he'll be - to death on the rocks
96:40
if he falls all of a sudden he looks
96:46
underneath the cliff and sees a
96:47
strawberry plant with a single red ripe
96:50
strawberry he smiles he reaches out with
96:53
his
96:55
takes the strawberry and eats it and in
96:57
that moment he's happy he's satisfied
97:01
with life now we don't know what's gonna
97:03
happen to this monk it doesn't look very
97:04
good though does it but it doesn't
97:06
actually look very good for any of us in
97:08
the long run right we all have to deal
97:10
with living in a moment-to-moment
97:12
situation and enjoying focusing on what
97:14
is happening right now that makes our
97:16
life good so we don't have Tigers and
97:19
raging rivers what we have are we have
97:23
things that we regret that there are
97:25
causing guilt and rumination and we have
97:27
the work that's yet in front of us the
97:29
raging river that may - us on the rocks
97:31
but all we can really do is focus in
97:33
this minute and do what needs to be done
97:36
at that time so thank you very much I
97:39
know you this a long time that you stuck
97:41
in here today I appreciate that do write
97:44
to me if you have questions about
97:45
anything that I've talked about today
97:46
they sure about I'll send you references
97:48
more resources and so on so thank you