Tag Archives: coaching

Family ties – we all have a story

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I am the youngest of my three siblings; I have a sister and two brothers. My husband, Tom, grew up the middle child with an older brother and a younger sister. All of our parents were deceased by the time we Blooming Grove cropped icaruswere in our mid-30’s and raising our own children.

My husband’s brother, Ted, died last November. Tom and Ted had an up and down relationship over the years but had come to a good place together last year. They got together for dinner on Wednesdays and had become good friends.

Yesterday, Tom and I drove 350 plus miles to a small community, Blooming Grove, near Williamsport, Pennsylvania to bury Ted’s ashes. Tom’s sister flew in from Arizona and several of their cousins who live in New England joined us. Why Blooming Grove? This is where seven generations of Schade’s are buried. It is a small community of Dunkard Baptists who first immigrated from Germany in the early 1800’s. A place in the Schade family history I’d only heard stories about until this trip.

Several of those generations are on our family photo wall. It is a work in process. Tom continues to add pictures from both of our families as we go through old boxes of photos. Our oldest granddaughter is five. She loves the movie Coco and understands it is about honoring and remembering your ancestors. When she visits, we often review the family photo wall and explain who everyone is.   Continue reading →

Shaping young minds and tomorrow’s leaders

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I was running late in wrapping up a meeting before my next one. I was meeting with a young IT staff member whose manager had encouraged him to get time on my calendar for career advice. We had acanstockphoto14947189 great half hour chat about his future goals. I introduced him to the next person patiently waiting to meet with me – the manager for telehealth – a young man who was relatively new to his position. I figured they should know each other.

The telehealth manager walked into my office after the intro and said “So you’re shaping young minds”. “Absolutely!” I replied.

I have adult children and so I realize how valuable this type of access and advice can be. I saw some of the challenges my daughters faced when they graduated from college and started to navigate and grow their careers. I asked myself, “why not be available to their generation?” After all, each of us can probably remember someone who helped us early in our careers. So I concluded it was time for me to give back; I made a commitment to help develop the next generation of leaders.

Even though I have had a full schedule as a CIO, I have been willing to take short calls and meetings with anyone who wants to talk about their career and get advice from me. They may be staff members in my IT department or in other departments. They may be students who work in my organization and need to interview the CIO for a class assignment. Or they may be someone to whom a colleague has suggested that I’d be a good person to meet. Many such referrals are for young women who want to learn from me as a female executive in IT. There aren’t that many of us yet in health IT but the numbers are definitely going in the right direction.  Continue reading →

Investing in you, the value of a coach

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I was fortunate to work with an excellent executive coach several years ago. He helped me gain new insight into who I am and how I lead. I am a much better leader as a result of our year-long work together. canstockphoto32422551And I periodically reconnect with him now to bounce around ideas when going through major transitions.

Deciding to work with a coach can be unsettling.

I told myself, “sure there are things on my performance evaluation I could work on but mostly I’m fine and don’t need any help; after all no one is perfect”.

And I also told myself, “ok, I admit I could use some help but how much do I really have to expose and what will people think if they know I’m using a coach”.

So yes, I had those kinds of thoughts when I started and expect you might as well.

But my coach put me at ease. He got to know me and started helping me look critically at my leadership style and areas I needed to improve. He was not there to judge me or make me feel inadequate. He took me where I was at.

A good coach doesn’t have all the answers but knows how to ask the right questions. Continue reading →