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If
you are currently stuck or at a crossroads in your career,
consider stepping back and . . .
Following
Your "Spirit" in Leadership and Career Decisions
by
Francine R. Gaillour, MD, MBA, FACPE, Executive and Career Coach
for Physicians
As
I write this month's issue of Daring Doctors, one of my long
time clients living in the Midwest is taking a bold step: he put the wheels in motion
to transition out of his clinical practice over the next 18
months, turning the reins of the operations to two physician
colleagues. He is in his early 50's and on the verge
---but not assured--- of entering a new career path in academic
medicine.
Key
phrase: "not
assured."
Pretty bold move.
 What
I find remarkable and worth sharing with my Daring Doctors
readers is that my client once described himself as
"risk-averse," "not one to take bold action."
What
I observe about him now is how much "in
spirit" he has become as he moves forward gracefully
and boldly along his
career journey.
Like
many physicians who are expanding their vision, his path is
paved daily with not only the strategies and tactics of
career-building, but also with the internal
"calling" of spirit.
Analytic
Decision-Making vs. Following Your "Spirit"
Twenty
years ago during my last year of Internal Medicine residency at
the University of Washington I was struggling to decide
what fellowship to pursue: Oncology or Nephrology? Did I
mention that I also had been accepted to start a Mayo Neurology
program on completion of my residency? Yikes! I was
pulling my hair out!
I
can remember sitting down with a pharmacist friend of mine (both
of us former engineering majors) sketching out on paper three
columns, one for each subspeciality path, and then outlining the pros and
cons.
Fast
forward to 1999 and I'm sitting in my MBA class absolutely thrilled
to be learning the formal technique of Decision Analysis using
a Decision Tree.
Ah,
the joys of analytical decision-making! Ah, the
realities . . .
The
Reality of Our "best" Decisions: An Internal
"Knowing"
Well,
if any of you have ever read my bio on my website, you know that I
never did column 1, 2, or 3, Oncology, Nephrology, or
Neurology. I followed a path that didn't show up on my
three-column decision matrix.
And
then I changed my path again several years later in a direction
that had not occurred to me when I was mastering the
Decision Tree.
In
retrospect, the best decisions I ever made were those where I
followed a a strong, energizing pull toward an idea or a
"notion." I see that with my clients all the
time.
While
smart career development requires sound strategies and bold
tactics, it also demands introspection and a willingness
to heed what your "spirit" is telling you is the "true
path" for you ---- and in many cases what is "not
the true path" for you.
How
Can You Balance Analytics With Spirit-Knowing?
There
is an old saying in marketing: Strategy is knowing
WHAT to do, Tactics is knowing HOW to do it.
In
a similar way, Spirit is pointing in the general
direction you should go, Analysis is applying your
cognitive skills and physical effort to making it happen in a methodical
way.
Here
are three suggestions for how you can get "in
spirit":
-
Do
anything that quiets your mind: meditation,
music, running, biking, walking, yoga etc.
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Read
books or articles that expose you to new ideas
-
Hang
out with or attend conferences or gatherings with people
who are "into" personal development or peak
performance -- this kind of energy (spirit) works
like a spark for your own spirit
Here
is a big secret: Once you become more attuned
to where your Spirit wants to take you, your analytical self
becomes much more effective. Look at it like this way:
Your analytical self wants a job to do; once you have a
spirit-led direction, all actions you take become smooth, swift
and easy steps in the "right" direction---no matter
how "bold" they look to others.
Francine R. Gaillour, MD, MBA,
FACPE, is an Executive and Career Coach for Physicians. Dr. Gaillour
specializes in helping physicians who are venturing into new territory
as leaders, entrepreneurs, and career adventurers. She
can be reached at (206) 686-4205, francine@physicianleadership.com
or use the
Contact Form
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Here
is my client, Dr. Scott Gebhardt, a successful and
visionary Internist from Florida, and we are at the Range Cafe
in Bernalillo, New Mexico. Scott and I are taking a
lunch break during our Client Strategy Session that kicked off
his Platinum Executive Coaching Program in March. New clients
have the option of traveling to Seattle or New Mexico for our
initial meeting.