I’ve been asked to tell how I ended up in this physician coaching space a few times over the last several weeks. So, I decided to do some reflective writing about my journey.

There were four major experiences that overlapped and culminated in the creation of Joy in Family Medicine Coaching Services, LLC.

First, my own personal burnout story which reached the pinnacle in March 2015.  Mine was mid-career in timing (11-20 years out).  I was absolutely loving academic medicine and all the many hats I had to wear.  I really felt like overall I was doing a good job.  Retrospectively, I aimed for perfection in each area and relied on external validation.  I hadn’t yet started viewing perfectionism as something I could dial up or down depending on the task.  I was 100% perfection-oriented on every task. That led to working through each and every lunch time, developing lectures at night, and foregoing socializing with colleagues as...

Coaching has been around in other fields for a couple of decades. Leaders in the C-suites of large corporations have long-since used coaching to keep up their A game. And though a small subset of physicians have found the benefits of coaching over the years, it was only in the last 5 years that data has been published about the benefits of physician coaching. The most well known study, released August 2019, showed decreased emotional exhaustion, decreased burnout, increased resiliency, and increased quality of life with physician coaching. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31380892/

Let's talk about what coaching is and what it's not.  

First what it's not - coaching is NOT therapy. It is not advising - advisors give advice - they guide, direct, and steer.  It is not mentoring.  Mentors are people the physician naturally looks up to and wants to emulate.  

Coaching is officially defined as "partnering with clients in a thought-provoking and creative process...