Creating Thriving Workplaces with Sarah Harris

00:00 - Andrea Moore (Host)
Welcome. Welcome, sarah. It's so good to have you on here. How are you doing today? I am great. Thank you so much for having me. 

00:07 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
I appreciate it. 

00:08 - Andrea Moore (Host)
Yes. So why don't you tell people a little bit about your background and what got you to where you are today? 

00:14 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
Sure, sure. So I am a licensed clinical social worker. I have my own private practice in Augusta, georgia. I've been practicing in mental health let's call it 20 years maybe a little more than that, but a little over 20 years at this point, with some with, especially in trauma, depression, anxiety, those types of things. Recently, though, I have launched more effort towards my public speaking, and so, in public speaking, what I've really found is that I'm giving all these skills to my clients, and then they're going into the workplaces and not having the opportunity to utilize them, because our workplaces are so focused on individualization and productivity that they actually don't pause to notice how the workplace is actually structured to counter productivity and retention. So that's kind of really my message that I'm trying to get across right now. 

01:26 - Andrea Moore (Host)
I love that and I thought this was such a great conversation to have, because it's not something that I've really discussed on this podcast in depth of. Every day people are going to jobs like you are spending 40 plus hours a week at a job, or even if you work part-time right, it's like good chunks of time and, depending on where you're going and who you're around, that time can be really challenging. It really can. 

01:51
And we have. There's so much good advice out there, Like I know I'm, you know, it's like I might suggest certain things and it's like, well, that's just not possible at my job, you know. And so why can you talk a little bit about what people run into, Like when you say things are structured against productivity? I love the way you put that, by the way, because it's mind blowing to me of like, do these people not, are they not able to like, think forward like a year to see that things are going to cost them so much more money when they're not taking care of their employees? It feels so common sense. But what kinds of things are working against individuals that are just trying to show up and do their job. 

02:33 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
Well, I think that one of the biggest things that I notice is the US culture, specifically, is very production driven and very individualized, and so it is about go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go go, and without using the team and the community around us and so being able to pause and say, hey, I may not be able to get this task done. Could you help me out with this? And we're afraid to say that, because management in a lot of settings has really set it up for us to say you need to perform and you need to do your job, and not ask somebody else to do your job. And I'm really trying to get across to managers and administrators that we're not asking for employees to be told they don't have to do their job. What we're saying is let's say that I'm a nurse and I'm working the floor and I'm supposed to go and run and check on my patient Great, I'm going to go check on my patient and then I'm going to come back to my nurse's station and I'm going to write my notes Fabulous. 

03:52
Well, then the buzzer goes off in that room again. 

03:55
If I'm in the middle of a note and another nurse walks by, I can say, hey, do you mind check in with them? If I need to do something, I'll be right there. Versus, I'm in the middle of my note and I'm typing that up and I'm hearing the buzz and I'm going oh my gosh, oh my gosh, I have to finish this note really fast and I have to make sure that it sets all the parameters that the documentation has to set. Oh, and then I have to go rush and check on that patient and stop what I'm doing, instead of just asking the community around us hey, do you mind just lending me a hand, even if that just gives me a two minute gap before I do the work. And I think that you know, if you think about the amount of money you even mentioned it a minute ago the amount of money that businesses are losing because we are not billion working days that are lost every year due to depression and anxiety, which is costing us globally a trillion dollars annually in productivity. 

05:20 - Andrea Moore (Host)
Wow, I don't know too many businesses that are looking to really lose that kind of money on a regular basis right wow, yeah, I think this brings up such a good point, and, uh, I did not know those stats. That's just like mind-boggling, and I'm like not surprised by it, though, because I feel like there's a push in the at at least in the circles that I hang out with in the mental health world of like don't talk about productivity. It's not about that, but it's like, at the end of the day, productivity is important, especially if you work a job like we do. We have to acknowledge we live in a capitalistic society, and so there is like being productive, I think humans, when it's done in a way that honors the human, I actually think being productive is really fulfilling. There's a lot of nuances there, but it's like productivity is not bad, like let's not. 

06:15
I'm just saying that because I think a lot of people listening might be like no, she's talking about productivity and that's bad and I was like it's really not like we'd like to be productive, like anyone listening. Think about when you get something done, you just like even if it's just like I just made this, like really nice meal for my family, or like, ooh, I finished this project. 

06:32 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
Like it feels good. 

06:34 - Andrea Moore (Host)
And so there's nothing wrong with productivity. What's wrong with it is when it's being emphasized and then we're doing all of these things to actually make it so much more challenging to be productive. Like it blows my mind of, like the disconnect between, you know, corporate and managers who are like productivity, productivity, and then they do all these things to undermine it and then like be mad that productivity isn't where it is. And it's like if you literally just like gave your employee a pee break, they'd actually probably be more productive. 

07:07 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
Yeah, yeah, and sometimes it can be that simple, and that's really the message I'm trying to get across is that I am not advocating for big, big, big, huge changes, right, we're looking at some really small things. So one of my favorite examples and I let my old manager know that I was going to be using her as examples, but I had a fabulous manager at a hospital that I used to work in, and so in most hospital settings the doctors settings the doctors are the top nurses, therapists, admins it all ranks down from there and my manager in the mental health unit was fabulous. She had a rule in our staff meetings that said everybody in the room has an equal voice, and that was known. And so one of the things that we talk about in increasing productivity in the workplace and taking care of mental health at the same time is do all the employees feel like they have equal voice? Do they feel like their value and worth is noticed and appreciated? And so we would go into these staff meetings and let's say that the problem was we're not responding to emergency calls fast enough, right? So then she would ask the admin staff well, talk to me about when you get that call or when somebody asks you to make a 911 call for us, how is that working for you? She would ask the nursing staff hey, tell me what's going on. 

08:57
When those crises happen and you're with another client, how are you handling that? Are you getting what you need? And everybody at every level had the same voice. And then we would come together to figure out as a team how can we solve this problem. Right, and that was huge, because you know, coming from a childhood where my mom was what used to be called a secretary, that's a no, no, no word anymore, right, but my mom was an administrative assistant and I would see her be treated oftentimes as a secretary, and then I saw her move to other employers that looked at her as you are an integral part of how our system functions. And so when we notice people and we give them a voice and we say what's your thought, how do you want to play a role in the bigger picture, right, that's such a huge benefit to their mental health. So, whether you are the admin assistant or whether you're the physician or the CEO, everybody has an equal voice yes, I that so much. 

10:26 - Andrea Moore (Host)
It's such a beautiful way to put it and I love how, when you were talking about even just that like chain, that happens with a 911 call, which I, you know, not something I've ever dealt with you know what I? 

10:34
mean. But it's like I think everybody, in whatever job they're in, they can see where there's this chain and it's like wherever the bottleneck is, wherever someone's struggling, it's going to affect everybody. Yeah, yeah, and yet it's. It's so challenging sometimes to bring everybody in it's and it's what do you think creates that challenge? It's like, why is it so hard to give people an equal voice? Like, what do you see as the main cause of that? 

11:02 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
I'm not. I think I'm not really sure exactly what the main cause is, because I think that oftentimes it varies from environment to environment so for example, when I worked in the hospital. 

11:16
That is an archaic structure that has been in place for hundreds of years, right, that, that's, that's the level. I think that sometimes it's also based on our, our belief that, depending on how many degrees you have college degrees you have, or letters after your name that that somehow means something more than it does Mm-hmm. Right, so, and I'm not dismissing that, I have letters after my name, I have multiple college degrees, yeah, but I'm not. So I'm not dismissing that effort, but understanding that sometimes that is more of a reflection of resources and time than it is of knowledge and understanding of the system. And so when we can start looking at people and saying, okay, admin assistant, sitting at the front desk, what are you noticing is causing the bottleneck, and that admin assistant may say well, you know what? What's happening is. We're telling people to come at 10. And the intake nurse is not getting to them until 1030. But the physician has them scheduled for 1045. So why is the intake nurse not getting them until 1030? Oh, okay, so then we can go to the intake nurse. 

12:54
Okay, so, intake nurse, what is happening from 10 to 1030? That is not allowing you to get them? Oh well, I didn't get the chart, or I'm in that staff meeting until 10 o'clock and then I have to get my stuff together and so I can't actually see a patient until 1030. Oh okay, so we actually need to not do intakes at 10 o'clock because we have that staff meeting from nine to 10 that usually runs over and then that's causing the bottleneck. Yes, right, so when all the levels are talking to each other and really owning their part, then we get to move forward. There was actually a really interesting study published by the US Surgeon General's office in 2022. And it identified five areas of well-being that need to be present for good mental health in the workplace, and those five areas were protection from harm, connection and community work-life harmony, mattering at work and opportunity for growth. And I think if we're going to work on those five areas, we have to overcome the biases that we have about mental health, right? 

14:19
So now that I think about that maybe more of the answer to your earlier question about what is some of the hang up, right, those biases. We think that mental health means that somebody's crazy. I don't even like the word coming out of my mouth, but we believe that they're crazy, we believe that they're irresponsible, we believe that they're dangerous. If you look at some of the language that we use in our culture going postal I don't know about you, but I I grew up with that phrase, right, somebody go postal. And when we think about what does that mean? Oh well, then they're crazy and they're going to go wipe out the entire workplace. No, quite honestly, most people that struggle with mental health conditions and diagnosable mental health condition, they actually are very terrified that their mental health condition is going to be seen and observed in the workplace because they don't want the bias Yep. So they're actually want the bias, yep. 

15:25
So they're actually hiding it all Totally. They're really, really hiding it all. I talk to my clients all the time about you know one of the introductory questions that I'll ask them. I'll say so. How often do you go home and cry in the shower and their eyes just get really wide and go? How do you know that? That's what I do and I'm like, oh, because a lot of people who struggle with mental health conditions have to hide right and so absolutely. 

15:51
They armor up at work and then go home and cry in the shower. 

16:12 - Andrea Moore (Host)
Yeah, yeah, and how much to? And it's like and I know this is not a, this is not a clear answer at all, because this is going to be a very, this, very different from person to person. Home, and let's just like, leave it vague like, or going home and crying in the shower, are doing so not because there's anything wrong with them, but because they are not being seen at work, their voice isn't being valued. They're basically being dismissed and then basically punished or chastised for, like, not being able to do their job when they were trying to speak up for the exact reason they can't do that. Right, it's like that. That's what gets you feeling crazy, and not to use that I know you don't like that word, I'll use that word a little more, like in a jest, I guess, but it's like. 

16:51
I think people can be like oh my God, like I'm feeling crazy here. Like I I'm trying to tell my boss what's wrong and they're not listening to me, and then they're getting mad at me for not addressing the very thing that's wrong, but they're not hearing me when I try to tell them what it is right. It's this like what is? How am I supposed to? It's like what's? It's so much bigger than them, it's not something that they can individually, you know, quote, unquote, fix, you know, if it's something that is broken because it's beyond them, and then yet it's like it's falling on them to to do something that's just so outside of their scope. 

17:27 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
Yeah, yeah, well, and I think that that really speaks to the idea that it has to come from both sides. So one side is that we have to feel as employees that we can advocate for ourselves. Yes, so that may look like saying, if you're receiving mental health therapy and I've really helped a lot of my clients be able to get here where they can go to their management and they can say, hey, my therapist only works business hours, can I leave an hour and a half early on Wednesdays so that I can go to my therapy appointment? But I will work an extra hour and a half every Tuesday so that I can take off on Wednesday. So they're not asking to work less. Most of them need the money to pay for therapy. Asking to work less, most of them need the money to pay for therapy. They're not asking to work less or to decrease their productivity. But what managers would notice then is that they are getting the help and the support through their therapy appointments to be able to navigate interpersonal dynamics, to be able to navigate the stressors of productivity needs, so that they can do that. So you end up with a healthier employee. Healthier employees stay at work, they don't call out sick. They have increased productivity, right? 

18:59
Or you know, sometimes it's as simple as if you've ever had the experience where you've gotten an email and they're asking a question. So let's say that your boss sends you an email and the email says hey, I've noticed that. Let's say that the project that we're working on has a whole bunch of corrections in it. I was wondering what the plan is to make those corrections. Now that email is fine. If you're receiving that at 10 am and you work office hours. Now I want you to put that email at 7 pm. So you're scrolling through your phone and your notification pops up that you have an email from your boss, and I would challenge your listeners how many of them feel like they have to then, at 7 pm, respond to that email at 7 pm? So my challenge to your listeners, if they're the employee one, would be to simply let their management know hey, I really want to be a team player here, but I will not be responding to emails that are not of an emergency nature outside of my working hours, and that answer needs to kind of be varied depending on what your field is. Right, if you are an ER physician and you're on call, I'm sorry, but you've got to respond. There are lives at stake. But if you are a engineer or an architect, is there any reason why you can't wait and respond to that email at 8am, right? So that would be my challenge. 

20:57
If you're on the employee end. 

20:59
My challenge to the managers and the administrators is why are you sending the email to them at 7 pm? If you are choosing to work outside of what is considered to be healthy hours, then set the send time, which you can do on all emails. You can set the send time to 8 am the next morning, right? So if you really are afraid that you are not going to remember to ask that question, fine, draft the email, but pause, because even if, as a manager, if you start the email with I'm sorry, you don't need to respond to this till tomorrow morning, we don't really have to talk about it. 

21:45
I just didn't want to forget what's going to naturally occur to the employees. They're going to say, oh, no, ok, I have to come up with a solution to this. This is something that's really pressing, and now you've hijacked their mental time, their mental decompressed time in the evening with finding a solution to that problem, and we don't want to do that. We really want to set those boundaries around work time, that work issues are only being addressed during work hours, unless you're the ER physician. 

22:20 - Andrea Moore (Host)
Yes, I want to bring back to one thing that you said earlier, because I think it's so. Here is the. You made a comment about knowing your scope, or like knowing your role. I forget the exact wording you use and I think this piece is like before we dive even into the other stuff is so important, because this is where I see people get caught up all the time is they are taking on responsibility for things that are not theirs to take responsibility for. Yeah, it's just not like they're within their job role and it doesn't mean that I think there again, there's nuance to everything If it doesn't mean you're just like, well, that thing is getting screwed up, so I'm just going to turn a blind eye, but it's just being very aware of. Like you know, hey, I spoke up for this one thing. I've done my part, I've drawn. 

23:09
Like you know, if there is something that's going on in another department or about another member of your team, or you know something that's happening, yeah, you can speak up, but it's not your job to fix it. You might need to know. Okay, do I need to say something here? Can I trust right? It's like there's going to be critical thinking. That has to occur at every level. But when you're really crystal clear on here is my role and this is my expertise and you're able to own it, decisions become way more easy. So it's like you were talking about the doctor has more degrees over their name, so they have this higher value, and it's like, yeah, if they're a surgeon, they should be the one who's giving information about what's happening during a surgery. But if the issue is around the prep time or the cleanup time that's happening afterwards, they shouldn't have a say because that's not their area of expertise. Like the janitorial staff or you know whomever is there. That's their expertise and they get to be the ones speaking up about it there. That's their expertise and they get to be the ones speaking up about it. So I think it's like the rightfully assigning whose expertise is this to speak up on and letting that person have the voice. And and you know, for every listener just thinking of like where is my role? 

24:22
And I think a lot of people want, want to skip this because it seems very obvious to them. They're like well, of course, like well, I'm, I'm the therapist, and it's like I have someone right now she might be listening who's an occupational therapist, and this is something we talk about a lot, because it's like there's a whole she's at a skilled nursing facility, so there's a lot of moving parts, and there's a lot of things where it's like other people on the team aren't stepping up or she's not even giving them the space to step up, because she's just taking on, like trying to take something on that she doesn't have the resources to do, and then getting really stressed about it, understandably, because it's like, oh my gosh, here's this thing that I'm seeing as this issue. That is an issue this person needs help with, but she doesn't have the resources to fix it, nor should she. It's nothing wrong with her at all. It's just making sure the person who does have their resources is notified, and that's where her then job ends. 

25:13
Right, it's like all right, I've made the note, I've made the notification to bring in this support staff, done, that's all she has to do, yeah, and and so what I just want? I want to state that because I think then, when you're talking about, like the emails and everything like this, when, when you know your role, like hey, you're an ER doctor, or hey, there's currently I'm in this project that has all these these time demands, and it's like I've actually worked with an architect who has done stuff after you know hours, because it's like, well, certain things, there are these deadlines, that things have to be done, and so it's like when you're very clear on like, okay, for this piece, this is necessary to work after hours, or this piece it's not an emergency. 

25:53 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
Well, and I think that you know, indra, it's really important that when you say that this piece, that those are temporary, because, oftentimes we will continue to justify outside of when it truly is a I have to right now. 

26:14
So the architect, if the building has a deadline to be done by December you know right now it's the springtime If it has a deadline of December and that architect says, well, but I have to get this response so that the next chain, the next part of the chain, can get it done, great. But my challenge to that architect would then be is the next six hours truly going to make a difference? Now, if we are at December 1st and it has to be done by the end of the year, that six hours might make a difference. But in the spring, if I wait six, eight hours until I get back to work, does it actually make a difference? And for other things, when I work with my folks who struggle with anxiety, one of the questions that I learned that comes out of the dialectical behavioral therapy modality is will this matter in five years? So when we're, when we're trying to make that decision about is this one of those times that Andrea and Sarah were talking about that I really have to respond right now. Then I would challenge your listeners to pause and just notice is this going to matter in five years and if it is, by all means, move forward, right? So the ER doc, if they get the call, you know, and they say, you know, I don't think I want to respond to that right now. Is that going to matter in five years? Yep, yep, it probably will, right, if it is a matter of we need to write a new policy and I'm finding these problems with the first draft If I choose to wait eight hours until I get back to the office in five years, is my waiting eight hours really gonna matter? No, because writing new policies takes months, if not years, to get the balls rolling, so that eight hours really needs to be spent with taking a breath, taking a break and really encouraging both sides like I said, the management and the employee side to really notice that right and being able to do that. 

28:41
There's a great quote that I found one day when I was looking around at material, and it's attributed to Sadhguru. That says there is no such thing as work-life balance. It is all life. The balance has to be within you. Work-life balance is such a catchphrase right now. Right, it's the thing, there's all the things about it. Find work-life balance, find work-life balance. And I thought what a great reframe to recognize this is not about work-life balance. This is about all of this is life. How are we choosing to spend our life? On both sides of the aisle, whether we're looking at the managers or the employees, yes, how are you choosing to spend life? Yes, and is that creating wellness within you? 

29:41 - Andrea Moore (Host)
Yes, I love that. I love that, yes, because I feel like that phrase is very gets gets used in ways that are not helpful. And I wanted to also go back to the emails, cause I do think emails are such a like emails, phone calls, things like this are such a place where people experience this tension and there's and I love that you just brought up, because and it's like I want to highlight this because it's such a simple thing that I think a lot of people don't know exists of the, you can pick your send time, cause I didn't know this existed until like a year ago or something, and it's fine. What happens is becomes this vicious cycle. Right, you have a manager who's sending an email at 7 pm. Then you have the person that's like I'm aware that if I don't respond, it's going to hijack my whole night, so it's just easier if I respond, right, and it does, it makes them feel better in the moment. So they respond, and what does that do? That teaches the manager that they can email them and they will respond. Respond, and what does that do? That teaches the manager that they can email them and they will respond. 

30:50
And so I had a client who had a manager that was just not someone who was exactly the most receptive person and would do this, and she was kind of stuck in this cycle and so this is exactly what I suggested. I was like respond then, like for your own sanity, because it really was, she could totally just chill after and usually there were quick things, right, but they were just annoying and it was you know it would, it would get in the way of her night. So I was like, but schedule your response for the morning. So you're just. And she was just like, oh, and it stopped. It was just like you. She trained him over. It just like took like a couple of weeks, right, and I mean she had already brought it up before. 

31:28
So I think there was like an awareness of it there. But like, then he just stopped asking and then she did, and so it went away Like, and obviously that's not going to be the case in every person's case, but there's just kind of ways that you will train your managers or train the admin that you will respond after hours when you are responding after hours, right, so if, if, as a temporary bridge into creating better boundaries, you are just setting the response, your own response time for the morning, or like not, don't do it at 8am, do it at like 10am, do it like well, within work hours, you also start to make it clear that you're not going to tolerate it. Right, right, right. I think this is the both, and right here is because we don't want like let's let's talk about. 

32:16
I think you've had some really beautiful language about how to like approach managers and how to approach bosses of things like that to start creating these boundaries. So how do you recommend somebody start this conversation? 

32:32 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
I think if you are in a managerial role, at whatever title, that that is for your organization, the first thing that I would suggest is completing an employee satisfaction survey and actually read it. Number one, number two come back to your staff and say, in reviewing the satisfaction surveys, these are the things that I saw. I would like to start a conversation about each of these. Top Okay. 

33:15
And sometimes, because most of us, when we are working in more unhealthy we won't even go all the way to the toxic, just the more unhealthy environments we tend to fill out those employee satisfaction surveys with all fives Everything's great, I love my job, everything's fabulous because nobody's going to read it. 

33:34
So if, as a manager, you're receiving those reports, know that it is less likely that that is actually the reality and that it's more of a response of protection. I don't want this to come back at me saying that I'm a whiner or that I'm a complainer. So if you're getting those responses right, then you come back to your staff in a small group setting and you say, hey, I noticed that I'm getting all fives, that everybody loves being here, and I kind of doubt that that's true and I would really like to have some candid conversation, so let me start with what I noticed. Candid conversation, so let me start with what I noticed. And so, as a manager, the more that you can put yourself in a vulnerable position and I say vulnerable with boundaries, I'm not saying go to your subordinates and say oh my gosh, my job sucks and it's so stressful and I can't handle this right. 

34:36
We're saying go to your subordinates with an example might be hey, you know what? The hospital's going through this merger right now and it is putting a lot of pressure on all the levels. I know for me, what I'm getting pressure about is right and that's hard for me. I would really like to hear where you guys are feeling the pressure. So that's what I mean by being vulnerable with boundaries. I don't have to be, as a manager, wide open. I don't have to lose my, my status or my presentation of power, but I do want to present as being a human being. Right, because if, as a manager, you are presenting to your subordinates at a superhuman level and you're saying I've got this and you know I'm strong for all of you and I've got this and this is the plan and this is what we're going to do, that automatically creates a wall where they're not going to feel comfortable coming to you and saying, hey, you know that new policy, I don't think that's working so well. 

35:54
Right, when I worked at the hospital we had so Jayco is the accrediting body for a lot of hospitals and if your department even is not fully meeting the Jayco requirements, they can shut you down, like as the representative is there following through things. They can say you don't meet criteria, shut down and send all your patients away. So we had this great thing where, at intake, we had four forms that the staff was filling out, and if you looked at the four forms, there was overlap over every form and it didn't make any sense and the staff was really overwhelmed going why are we spending so much time doing all this paperwork? And so I was assigned to go back and relook at it and review the Jayco requirements, and what I found was Jayco kept changing the rules and so another form would be created to meet the rule. Nobody ever bothered to say hey, what if we just recreate one form to include the old information in the new information? 

37:08
Remember, I worked for that fabulous manager who said if it's not working for you, come to me with a solution. What are you willing to do? And so I knocked on her door and I said, hey, can I have a slightly decreased caseload for my individual clients While I go through and review all the Jayco requirements and figure out which of these components of these four forms do we actually still have to have and which ones can we toss? And she said said that sounds great. Now that sounds like a really quick and dirty kind of project. It actually took me six months, oh my gosh. It took me six months, but at the end of six months I was able to come up with one form, one from four to one that now they use to do the intake, and there's not a repetition of the same questions from form to form to form. And so now we've streamlined, we're taking less time. 

38:08 - Andrea Moore (Host)
Yes, right, I love that. I love that on so many, on so many levels of just the one the ability for healthy conversation. Right, she's clearly created a culture where you're able to go to this and I love the emphasis on this bring a solution. Because that's a big conversation I have with a lot of my clients. It's like, okay, I understand that you don't like this one piece, but like, how do you envision it could be different? And I think, coming up with at least some semblance of a solution, because sometimes it can be really challenging when it's not clear cut or some of the things are outside of yourself. But it's like there's got to be. Even if the solution is, we need to come together as a team and talk about this right to figure out what the solution could even be. 

38:52
And I think you said something so important that I feel, like a lot of people, why people aren't willing to take that step is you ask for a reduced caseload. It's like you are doing such a service to the hospital by doing that. I can't even imagine how much time and energy you taking that time has saved Massive, like massive, I'm sure. Yeah, and it's like so. It's like you were asking to, to be able to have the time to do that and then presenting a solution. And I think that so often what happens is people are like, well, if I present this solution, it's going to end up just being more work for me and I'm already burned out, I'm already exhausted. So I just want to say that was like such a beautiful, like encompassing of, like healthy communication and how things can work, yeah, yeah. 

39:42 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
And then and it ties back into that surgeon general report when it talked about opportunity for growth and feeling like you matter at work. So, personally, one of my strengths is organization and I can read through all of the dry governmental regulations and do all the tedious and stay very organized. Just a skill. 

40:07 - Andrea Moore (Host)
That a lot of clinicians don't really do. It's not my. I'm like, if anything is like government, like this, like any tax, form. 

40:13 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
I'm like oh my god, it's in another language, I can no longer know how to read. I'm like what? Oh my God, it's in another language I can no longer know how to read. 

40:19 - Andrea Moore (Host)
I'm like what's my name? I don't know. 

40:21 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
It's just that I know that that's a strength of mine right. 

40:24
Then that manager also knew that and she said great, I have other strong clinicians Not that I'm not a strong clinician Other strong clinicians that can pick up some of these other tasks. Well, you do the thing that you do really well. Right, and so that would be the other piece that I would talk to managers about when they are talking with staff. Ask them what do you feel like is your biggest strength you feel like is your biggest strength, what do you contribute to the team that you feel is over and above what somebody else made you? And what you might find is, you might find that new team leader that you didn't even know was in the ranks Right, and that team leader may be a 20-something year old. 

41:17
And it may not be the 45-year-old, right, because maybe the 45-year-old doesn't like being in charge. But you were promoting the 45-year-old to team lead because of their time, because they're good at their job. Well, just because they're good at their job doesn't mean that they're going to make a great leader. But the 22-year-old may also be really good at the job, but may have great leadership skills and may feel really comfortable in that role. And so when managers come back and they say, hey, what do you contribute? What do you really enjoy about this position? Now, as an employee, I feel heard, I feel seen. And so what am I more likely to do? I'm going to stay working for that manager. Yes, right, because that manager sees me and they hear me and they want to help me to grow. 

42:21 - Andrea Moore (Host)
Yes, yes, I love that. One of my jobs we had, we all took strengths finder the strengths finders like quiz as part of the hiring process and it was always something that was like brought into developing little teams and what we call the pods within that to make sure different people had different strengths. I feel like that was like brought into developing little teams and what we call the pods within that to make sure different people had different strengths. I feel like that was something that was. Yeah, it really does make you feel valued and when you are doing something you like, you're way more likely to do it and work hard at it. Yes, yes, so I want to bring in, because you talked about it, really beautiful for someone who's in the manager position. What about someone who's the employee, who is has a manager who they might not feel is receptive? And I say I think this is actually a really common thing is people get stuck in this cycle and this grind and they're like my manager would never listen to me, my boss doesn't listen, and obviously there are times where the boss doesn't listen, right, but I will say the vast majority of the times that I have worked with a client to come up with how to approach their boss and have a conversation, and it's done from a way where they feel like empowered, they feel solid about it and they're usually super nervous about it. It goes so much better than they expected, like nine times out of 10. And so I'm curious if you see something similar. It's like I don't know. I see you know a small, very small subset of people, so it's like I don't know what the percentage would be on a wider population. 

43:56
But I really feel like when you can come from a place of a win-win, you understand how it does, how it is a benefit for the business, and you speak from that angle. That's what I find to be super key. You're not speaking from the like I'm so burned out and I'm exhausted, even if that's all true, like tell that to me, tell that to Sarah, she's your therapist right, like we have. But when you're having a conversation with your boss, it comes from like here's how this is affecting the business and here's what I think the solution could be, and it ends up being a win-win because you're benefiting from it and they're benefiting from it. As Sarah has spoken to, of all the like increased productivity you actually can see when you take care of your employees. I find people are receptive and obviously there's exceptions and there's places where you know they try to be receptive and change doesn't happen. But I'm curious what you see or how you suggest approaching a conversation like that. 

44:48 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
So I I use the word and a lot right. So, and meaning when you're talking with your manager. So, and meaning when you're talking with your manager, start with what is important to them. People always want to be heard, so if we start with what's important to them, I've noticed that this is a really big project. I've noticed that the company is growing faster than we can really keep up. I've noticed that we have a lot of layoffs, or I've noticed that it's the summertime and a lot of people are calling out. 

45:37
Whatever it is Right. So you want to talk to your manager about the things that are important to them. First, make sure that they feel that you are aware, at least at some level, as to the challenges that they're facing. Once we have established that, then we go to our own personal experience. So let's use summer vacation. Summer vacations are coming up, right? 

45:59
So if I'm working in a place where a lot of people tend to call off for summer vacation and it's really stretching the productivity, right times are coming up and that that makes it really hard to schedule and what ends up happening is that all of us start working overtime to cover up and that's really costing you a lot because you have to pay me time and a half if I work overtime For me. When I work overtime, I get really tired. I notice that my productivity slows down because I'm here longer and I have less time to take a break, and so I'm kind of sluggish when I come in. Or I've noticed that when I work those overtime hours that I'm more cranky and more irritable, and I don't want to live like that at home and I don't really want to interact with my coworkers that way either. Could we now? So, if you notice, now I've said this is what management is experiencing. This is how I'm experiencing it. 

47:11
Right, and now I'm going to present with a possible solution. Right? Could we set up a rotation of how we get those times off? Or could we do more cross training so that when we take time off, we're not burnt out when we come back, because our desk is piled up with things already that weren't done while we were gone? Right? So I'm going to offer what are the potential solutions and then I'm going to say where is my bottom line and where am I willing to adjust. So my bottom line might be I can tell you right now that a lot of us call out sick when we're not really sick because we're burned out over the summers because of the extra workload, right? So this is the potential consequence for you right Now. I'm also going to let management know. Where am I willing to wiggle? Okay, I think that a lot of us would be more willing to do four tens or four twelves instead of five eights, or I think that some of us would be willing to come in earlier and some of us would be willing to work a little bit later if our schedules were adjusted over this timeframe. 

48:38
What are some things that you think might work to solve the problem? Right? So, again, it's about the ands and we've talked about that quite a bit today, really recognizing that we can't expect management to just fall at our feet and accommodate to everything that we are asking for. But the managers also can't expect that the employees are going to keep just pushing and pushing and pushing, because they will burn out. They do get stressed, productivity levels decrease, absences increase because we know the mind-body connection and I know that's a huge component of your, your podcast is that mind body connection? And when the mind is not being taken care of, the body shuts down. Yes, so we get the cold, we get the flu, we get the pneumonia, we get all of those illnesses and then they can't come to work yeah. 

49:37
Yeah exactly. 

49:37 - Andrea Moore (Host)
They just can't. 

49:38 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
Yeah, right. So now you have absences, you have increased healthcare costs, you have decrease in productivity, of all these problems. So we really have to be willing to work on both sides. But those employees, if they approach management from that standpoint and I will make one last point about that I think that we also need to be aware of the significant culture change that has happened over the last 15 to 20 years. 

50:14
So I've got a little bit of age on me and I remember beginning my work career and it being a culture where you were expected to turn off your personhood, anything going on at home, anything going on with your kids, anything going on internally, turn that off, show up to work. And I often tell the story of. I remember my very first retail job Back when I was in high school. There was a sign above the time clock that said leave it at the door and it was very clearly stating and it was very clearly stating whatever is going on outside of these walls is not my problem. And so some managers that maybe are in the later parts of their career grew up in that mentality and so there may be a little bit of pushback of not growing up in that culture. 

51:21
Now my niece is 29 and she is coming up very much in this culture of wellness and of taking care of self. And you know those folks that came through the pandemic and everybody went, yay, we is never going to listen to that. I don't know that. It's not that they're not going to listen, but you do have to understand where are they coming from? What cultural background are they coming from in the corporate sector? 

52:13 - Andrea Moore (Host)
Yes, right, I think this is so important and goes into one thing that I wanted to add onto what you said. It is is one thing I find really helpful for my clients is to remember that their manager is a human right and, like you, like brought up like a merger, for instance, and it's like they're probably also experiencing immense amount of stress. You might not have any idea what they're going through at home, and I find this is really helpful, for it's just like step into their shoes so you can speak to your first point of understand what they care about. Or maybe, even if you just take a moment to observe them, I'm like, wow, they seem really stressed. Wow, they're all of a sudden, you're seeing their snippiness, or maybe they are like really critical as like Ooh and it's not excusing it, it's just, it's just noticing it of like wow, I can see where they're kind of this hair trigger Like that means that they're super stressed. And so it's like when you can step into their humanity and understand what culture they grew up in, notice the language they use, then you can like choose which pieces to highlight the most. 

53:22
So like I had a boss where it's like it was like the running thing of like do not mention an emotion to her, like do not say any words that have an emotion. And so it took some finagling of like. Okay, if I had an issue and it was having a conversation like this, I had to like practice it in my head because I'm like a very emotional speaker of like. I'm feeling, like oh, that was a thing you cannot say I feel, do not start anything with, I feel because you're done Right. And so it took some you know finagling of like how to present it. So she cares about it, so she sees how it's affecting her business, because that's what she cares about. 

53:56
And it didn't mean she didn't care about us. She actually did a lot. I think I saw that more in retrospect. I couldn't really see it in the moment, but it's just not how she communicated, it's not how she thought, it's not how she saw the world. And so when I could speak to her humanness from her viewpoint and what she cared about, I still got what I needed and she got what she needed. It was again, it's this win-win, and sometimes we have to be okay with just adjusting our language, just like we would for different friends that we have. We speak differently to our grandma than we do to our spouse. You know what I mean. It's like we do this every day, and so I think it is a willingness to adjust your language to your manager, because it's a win-win. It's not like a I've heard pushback on that. I'm like, oh well, then I'm shutting down myself and it's like no, you're not, you're actually getting what you want out of it, and it's a person that's sitting in front of you. 

54:50 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
Right, right, yeah, and I think also, you know, helping managers to recognize that in this discussion, we are not at all asking any of them to be licensed therapists, we're not asking them to have therapy sessions with their employees. We are simply saying that same thing. Both sides need to recognize that the other side is a human side, yes, right, and that that nobody's a robot, nobody's a number. If we just start looking at each other a little bit more, just a little bit more as human, and how much further we can go with that, it would be really awesome. 

55:32 - Andrea Moore (Host)
That is such a beautiful sentiment, and I could keep asking you so many more questions, but we'll end on that, because it is so, so beautifully said Seeing everyone's humanity is just a wonderful way to make the world a better place. 

55:46 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
Yeah, yeah, we'll keep advocating for it. 

55:49 - Andrea Moore (Host)
Yes, I love that. Well, thank you so much, Sarah. I think this was really really insightful conversation and hopefully it's given people things very actionable that they can hopefully go do if they're struggling in the workplace. And if people want to learn more from you or talk to you more, where can they find you? 

56:06 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
So my website is saraharrisspeakscom and there's all kinds of great information there about the talks that I do and resources for how to access good communication skills. 

56:23 - Andrea Moore (Host)
Yes, and you can bring Sarah into your workplace or advocate that she gets brought in to talk to your managers, if that's something that you think could be helpful. 

56:31 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
That would be great. 

56:32 - Andrea Moore (Host)
Yeah. 

56:33 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
All right. 

56:34 - Andrea Moore (Host)
Thank you, Sarah. 

56:35 - Sarah Harris (Guest)
Thank you so much for your time. I appreciate it.