Grief and loss during the holidays

In this Season of Gratitude as we celebrate holidays with family and friends, I am mindful that it can be a very difficult time for people who are grieving. A particular holiday song can be a trigger, decorations can be a trigger, just about anything can be a trigger. Whether it’s been a few weeks or many years since losing a loved one, holiday times can be especially difficult.

Being mindful of what others may be experiencing is so important. I won’t pretend to be an expert in helping people process their grief, but I have certainly experienced it this year with family members. Being aware of what they are going through, letting them talk openly about it, and just listening is my best advice. There are no right words.

While social media can be a pit of negativity, there are also bright spots of inspiration and positive messaging. I saw something on Facebook recently and shared it with my sister whose husband passed away in September. Healing Hugs (a non-profit organization that helps support parents who have lost children) shared these words from Angela Miller, founder of the grief organization, A Bed for My Heart:

There are no rules for surviving holiday grief.

Do what you need to do to survive.

Honor your loved one how you need to, and do what feels best for your fragile, aching heart.

You are missing a huge piece of you, so do whatever you need to do to find a sliver of peace.

I also saw something shared on Facebook about holiday host etiquette from Sarah Nannen who writes about the paradoxes we face in life, grief, motherhood, and our shared humanity:

If you’re inviting someone to your home and they’re grieving, be sure you’re inviting their grief to attend, too. It will be there, anyway.

Don’t invite someone with the goal of cheering them up for the holidays. Don’t expect them to put on a happy face in your home. Don’t demand they fake it til they make it or do something they don’t want to do, either.

Invite them with the loving intention of offering cheer and companionship and unconditional care during the holidays. To do this, you will need to honor and be responsive to their needs and emotions. Continue reading

Ban books? No, encourage young readers

It’s that time of year – whatever holiday you celebrate during this Season of Gratitude there is likely some gift giving involved. You may have an obligatory attitude of just getting it done or (hopefully) a more positive giving attitude spending time selecting thoughtful and more personalized gifts. When I had leadership teams reporting to me, I would give them a book each year. It was often the hardest gift to buy – deciding on the perfect book that they would all like. Over the years, my books included some of the best titles on innovation, leadership, technology, public health and more.

Now my holiday gift book buying is all for younger people. In addition to the one big gift for each of my grandchildren, I get them a book. I will be starting two of them on the “National Geographic Kids Almanac 2023” this year – it is filled with information on animals, science, nature, technology, conservation, and more.  I bought “Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls: 100 Inspiring Young Changemakers” for one of the granddaughters at my daughter’s suggestion. I was delighted to get the suggestion as I have been patiently waiting for my granddaughters to be old enough so I could start buying some of the feminist books for girls I see in bookstores. And for my grandson who loves all sports and is learning to read, I’m getting a fun story he should like – “The Dog That Stole Football Plays”. The football player on the cover has a “Jets” jersey on and that happens to be the name of my grandson’s flag football team. Hoping he loves the story, and it encourages him to read more!

I have another book buying annual holiday tradition that continues. I buy a book for each of my grandnephews and grandnieces back home in Minneapolis where I’m from and where my siblings and their families all live. That group is older – mostly teenagers. So, we have progressed over the years from picture books when they were little to books focused on their interests including baseball, ballet, and opera during middle school years, to more scholarly and political books now that they are in high school. For example – “A Choice of Weapons” by Gordon Parks, “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglas”, and “The 48 Laws of Power” by Robert Greene. I count on my three nieces to help me with recommendations and to understand their kids’ evolving interests. The grandnephew who wanted baseball books when he was younger is now into Nordic skiing and heavy metal with his own band. Yes, with my sister’s (their grandmother) help, I found a book he will like.

I can’t talk about nurturing young readers without mentioning the current banned books controversy that goes hand in hand with concerns about teaching critical race theory and talking about LGBTQ. Continue reading

Grateful for the love of family, savoring the moments

What can I say at Thanksgiving this year that is new and unique? How about the fact that two of the biggest birds I’ve ever seen flew by my home office window yesterday? You guessed it, they were wild turkeys. Yes, we live in a more rural area now. In fact, last year while the dogs and I watched two wild turkeys strut along behind our townhouse (you can imagine what the dogs thought….lot of yelping through the window), my husband who was on a conference call later told me he saw a third one up in a tree wondering how it got there and not looking very elegant as it tried to get out.

On the turkey cooking front, we had to cook ours yesterday, two days in advance with a plan to reheat it on Thanksgiving when the family arrives. Why? There were no frozen turkeys at the store and buying a fresh one 4 days in advance we have learned is too far – google says cook within a day or two. Guess that’s my health angle for this post – not serving my family old fowl that will make them sick, and my technology angle – depending on the power of google to ask any question and get an answer. The downside is when everyone arrives, we won’t have that wonderful turkey cooking in the oven fragrance throughout the house. There’s an idea for a candle maker! But the upside is more room in the single oven to reheat the side dishes our daughters are bringing.

I’ve said to a few people that we’re ready for plenty of chaos as the six adults will be outnumbered by our four grandkids and three dogs including a very active 7-month-old puppy that is bigger than both our 3- and 14-year-old little dogs. But it will be wonderful, loving, family chaos. The best kind!

10 years ago on Thanksgiving I was on baby watch. I had just moved to Ann Arbor for my new CIO job and was living alone for 9 weeks. My first grandchild was due any day out in California. Continue reading

Reflections on recent career conversations

I’ve often written about career advice. After talking to several people in transition while I was at the CHIME 2022 Fall Forum last week, I decided it’s a good time to revisit the topic. Here are some of those interactions – anonymized of course – followed by my general advice given the common themes:

  • I asked a colleague who I knew was unhappy with their situation a few years ago how things are going these days. I got the same response as before – still unhappy. I say, time to do something about it. No one should stay in an organization or position where they are truly unhappy if there are options out there.
  • I met a CIO whose position was eliminated due to a merger. While actively looking for the next position, there are concerns that lacking Epic experience at the CIO level is an obstacle. Yes, there are benefits to having worked with a particular vendor and understanding the challenges and issues with their products and services but as I like to say, the CIO is not doing report writing in the tool so in the end, does specific vendor experience matter?
  • I met a CIO who is concerned about ageism. Will they be given a chance if they are 60 years old? There are laws against age discrimination but unfortunately, we know it’s a reality. I say go for it and focus on your experience.
  • I spoke with someone who is mid-career and unhappy in their current organization given cultural issues and limited opportunities. They are actively looking at a wide range of options as they should be.
  • I got an email from someone at a vendor whose position was eliminated and wanted help networking. I connected that person with someone who is well connected in that specific part of our industry.
  • I spoke to a couple CIOs who have retirement dates set. They will be thinking about the next chapter and whether to go cold turkey or stay involved in some way. The beauty of that phase is you can pick and choose, say “yes” to what you are passionate about and “no” to what you no longer want to do.
  • I spoke to a CIO who isn’t ready to retire but is open to working less and considering alternatives. This may be a growing trend after the pace and demands of the past few years.

And I spent time with some of the people I have formally coached in recent years. Hearing how they are doing and seeing how they have grown in their roles and careers is very rewarding. I’m honored that I helped in some small way. Continue reading

A post vacation teaser for future posts

I am just back from a long vacation in Europe. Probably too long away from home but it was wonderful overall. I learned a lot, saw a lot, took hundreds of pix that I now must organize, kept in touch with family back home, and made some new friends.

And I have a lot of takeaways for future blog posts such as:

  • smart technology in everyday life (Europeans seem ahead of us)
  • importance of infrastructure (can’t say enough positives about the train system in Europe)
  • value of language translation tools (Google translate is a great tool for basics)
  • learning value of travel (part of trip was Road Scholar cruise with professors lecturing onboard and local experts on tours)
  • email management (the art of monitoring while on vacation)
  • and yes, some political commentary (Europe knows what it takes to fight fascists and Nazis)

I will be writing some of these posts in the weeks to come as I am still catching up and getting back into work and routines.

I leave you with a quote we saw on a small riverboat in Narbonne, France (which looked like a wonderful place for retirement if you didn’t have family and grandkids you wanted to see often). I used the Google translate app to get this: “If you think adventure is dangerous, try routine, it’s deadly!”

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Paying it forward with career advice

I get a lot of calls, emails, and LinkedIn messages asking for career advice. Knowing that people have been very supportive of me over my career, I try to pay it forward. I do a short call, find out where the person is at in their job search and career transition, ask some key questions, and give whatever advice makes sense for their situation. For people I know well and keep in touch with during their search, I often share useful articles that I find. These may include resume writing and layout, prepping for the interview, how to follow-up after the interview, dealing with rejection, how to identify red flags, or building your personal brand.

Many of the resources I have found and shared are from LinkedIn which as we all know is the “go to” for professional networking and content.

A Fortune article by Jennifer Mizgata in March of this year addresses a key question many people are faced with – “Should I take a fancy new career opportunity or stick with the old job I still like?”.  In it she references a great HBR piece, “A Scorecard to Help You Compare Two Jobs”, written in 2017 by a former colleague of mine from Mass General, Allison Rimm. It includes a scorecard tool similar to one I have used when doing career coaching.

I’ve written a lot on career management over the years. My post, “Career advice revisited” from May 2021 has links to most of them. Check it out and share with anyone you know who might find it helpful. In other words, let’s pay it forward!

Note – I am taking a short break from writing new posts over the next month. With all the blog posts I’ve written over the past 8 years, I’m using this break to share some of my “classics”. Thank you for being a subscriber – I hope you will encourage your colleagues to subscribe in the coming year.

Living a balanced life?

As summer comes to an end, I hope you find yourself renewed and more relaxed. And that you’ve made some great memories with family and friends. The time between Labor Day and the end of year holidays can be a very busy and intense time in healthcare systems. I recall a VP colleague from my Brigham and Women’s Hospital days who would say after Labor Day – tell your family that they won’t see you much until the holidays as new initiatives would start ramping up at an intense pace.

Whether you are consistently busy at work or dealing with peaks and valleys throughout the year, it’s important to keep trying to achieve that elusive life-work balance. I’ve written several posts in the past that might be worth revisiting:

Renewal, big rocks, and the elusive work life balance

Managing priorities and maintaining balance

Family first

Do you know your big rocks?

Note – As part of my life-work balance, I am taking a short break from writing new posts over the next month. With all the blog posts I’ve written over the past 8 years, I’m using this break to share some of my “classics”. Thank you for being a subscriber – I hope you will encourage your colleagues to subscribe in the coming year.

 

Best employers for women – is your organization on the list?

It’s Getting Harder to be a Woman in America by Claire Suddath, senior writer at Bloomberg Businessweek, is a powerful, must-read piece for anyone concerned about what is happening to women in this country.

I have long been a champion for women and a proud feminist. Doing what I can while in leadership roles to support women, not being afraid to speak out on women’s issues, and voting for candidates who are truly pro-women’s rights. I encourage you to do the same.

It was good to see the recent Becker’s story “30 hospitals, health systems and biomedical companies on Forbes’ top 100 list of best employers for women” that listed all 30 and their rank within the top 100. According to the Forbes article, “America’s Best Employers for Women”, the survey respondents were asked to rate their organizations on criteria such as working conditions, diversity and how likely they’d be to recommend their employer to others. These responses were reviewed for potential gender gaps. Female respondents were then asked to rate their employers on factors such as parental leave, discrimination and pay equity, and to nominate organizations in industries outside their own. Representation at the executive and board levels were also factored into the final score.

If your organization didn’t make the list, ask yourself what you can do. Are you in an HR leadership position and able to directly influence employee policies and benefits? Are you an IT leader who consistently creates a supportive culture and values diversity? Regardless of your position, do you help create a supportive work environment?

We’re all in this together – at home, at work, and in our communities.

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Leadership lessons from Nana Camp 2022

My husband and I recently had the joy of our first ever “Nana Camp” – four days with our four grandkids ages 6-9 at our house. One family is two girls ages 9 and 7. The other family is a 7 year old girl and 6 year old boy. I have been talking with my daughters about doing nana camp since I reduced my work hours this year making more time for family.

We now live in a townhouse in Plymouth, Massachusetts, with a couple swimming pools in our development, nearby beaches, and history rich field trip opportunities. A perfect setting for nana camp! Not until we were on our field trips (Plimouth Patuxet Museums including the Patuxet Homesite, 17th-Century English Village, Mayflower II and Plimoth Grist Mill) did I realize they have missed school field trips the past few years due to the pandemic which made these outings even more special.

After the four cousins spent July 4th together, my two daughters and I came up with the framework for nana camp rules which started a few days later. The first night they were all here, I had the kids write out the rules and post them on the refrigerator door. Just the act of writing them together tested some of the rules. It was their idea to each sign the rules like a contract.

Don’t get me wrong, all four of them are awesome and well behaved but get them all together and there’s bound to be what we later described as “silly fights”. So much so that on the last day we joked about making silly fight badges for them and how many they would all get.

Siblings have their day-to-day routines at home, but all four cousins together can disrupt that. Arguing and jostling over who takes the first shower at night, which row they get in the mini-van, who gets to walk the dogs first – you get the idea. The oldest had an astute observation a few days later when we had just her and her sister here for a short mini-camp. With just two of them they didn’t need to have silly fights – there were two showers to use so both could be first, there were only two kid seats in our car so front vs back row wasn’t a fight, and there were two dogs to walk.

These were the rules we agreed on with “be safe and have fun” underlying them:

  1. Be kind
  2. Be inclusive
  3. Respect privacy
  4. Work it out
  5. Clean up after yourself
  6. Let others sleep

Kindness should go without saying but in a period where we see so much bullying in our society, we must emphasize it. For these kids it was ensuring silly fights didn’t turn into mean words. Inclusiveness is critical to teach on so many levels. For these kids it was about taking turns and not excluding someone from a game or activity. Respect privacy meant if someone needed alone time, let them have it. Work it out meant don’t come tattling to us – try to work it out themselves. We learned over the days that these rules could conflict with one another and that there were times when they needed adults to help them work things out together. Continue reading

Vacation season reminders for a more balanced life

I’ve written a few posts in previous years about the importance of taking vacation time and truly taking a break from work. It seems even more important this year after 2+ years of Covid and the realities of remote work where separating work from one’s home life can be a challenge.

I’ve also written about work life balance, or life work balance as my colleague David Muntz likes to say. For years it was elusive, but I am doing much better getting the right balance at this late stage of my career.

Summer is already a third over. Hopefully you have made plans for a break of some sort with family or friends in the next few months. My husband and I have our first international trip since 2018 planned for later this summer. Seeing friends posting photos from their Europe trips in recent months is encouraging – it tells me that international travel is doable again.

As you make your own personal plans for downtime, remember the 6 R’s of summer – rest, relax, refresh, renew, reflect and reboot. And if you have to work or keep in touch with work while you take a break – check out “4 tips when you must work on vacation”. Let me know if you have any tips to add.

My post “Take time to reboot” is a great reminder that you can leave your work in the trusted and capable hands of others while you are away. That’s exactly what I intend to do!

Happy summer to all!

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