Over the past month, we went through some foundational steps to optimize your experience even when you couldn’t control the situation by up-leveling our mindset. We then looked at a couple of advanced options to grow our perspective in a way that serves us better.  This week, I want to give you a couple of helpful hints. 

Improving your mindset is a skill set. And, like any skill, it takes practice, patience, and continued learning.

It’s common to get to...

Last week, I introduced a framework called the Thought Model for those of us not trained as behavioral scientists. In it, we examine how our automatic thoughts affect us. This week, we examine an advanced option that involves intentional thoughts.

Before I get there, I want to clarify that you do NOT have to move on to this step. Just the awareness of your thoughts and separating facts from the story provides a better and broader perspective. Plugging the facts and automatic...

Over the last two weeks, I’ve laid out two fundamental steps to optimize your frame of mind. If you do nothing else, that alone is beneficial. This week, I’m ratcheting it up a notch to a more advanced step. This is the Thought Model Framework, developed from positive cognitive psychology by Brooke Castillo, a master-certified coach. This framework showed a positive impact in the largest multi-center controlled trial to date in GME. 

It’s essentially a...

Your mind is a powerful tool for improving your day-to-day experience of your given situation. Last week, we discussed the first step of optimization—writing and reflecting on your thoughts. This week, we will use that download to move on to Step 2. 

By default, we believe our thoughts to be true. However, physicians, like most humans, have imperfect brains. Our thoughts, the sentences in our heads that our minds automatically produce, are colored by our experiences,...

It's been a while since I walked through some step-by-step methods of up-leveling our mindsets, so now seems like a great time for all of us to review this fundamental coaching strategy. Over the next few weeks, I will walk you through one method of optimization I use with those I coach mostly pulled from the framework set out by Brooke Castillo. 

Mindset is a mental inclination, a way of thinking. It's essentially the lens through which you view things, a frame of mind....

As we conclude our blog mini-series on faculty using coaching skills, we arrive at the pivotal task of assisting in internalizing learning and accountability. This final step is crucial in the coaching process, as it ensures that the knowledge and responsibility gained are fully integrated.

Skill Outline Review:

• Create a Safe Space
• Deep Listening
• Develop Awareness
• Partner to Define/Design Progress
• Assist Internalization of Learning
• Assist Accountability Plan

Assist Internalization of...

We are in our blog mini-series of faculty using coaching skills.  A couple of weeks ago, we walked through an overview of and covered the first, Creating a Safe Space, followed by last week’s Deep Listening and Developing Awareness. This week, we will take a deeper dive on the skill Partnering to Define and Design Progress.   

I want to offer that not every situation calls for a coaching approach. It will often still serve you and the trainee best to take the...

We have pivoted from our blog on physician coaching and moved onto faculty using coaching skills. Last week, we walked through an overview of the coaching skills to incorporate as faculty and covered the first Creating a Safe Space. Today, we move on to Deep Listening and Developing Awareness.

As mentioned last week, most of you as faculty already have many of the skills needed to coach your residents – especially in skills-based or performance-based topics. It’s much like...

We are continuing to unpack coaching skills for faculty. Two weeks ago, we covered how faculty taking a coaching approach differs from physician coaching. Last week, we walked through a coaching approach for faculty to consider when working with residents on their individualized learning plans (ILP). Today, I hope to offer you an overview of the coaching skills to incorporate as faculty and then dive into the first — Creating a Safe Space.

The great news is that most of you as...

As I end the physician coaching series to focus on faculty, I want to continue the conversation from last week about faculty taking a coaching approach in their roles. Today, I’ll touch on individualized learning plans (ILP). 

The ACGME’s more recent standards for programs to train residents under a Competency-Based Medical Education model require that an ILP “should be formulated by the learner, include personal learning objectives, and identify...