Maria Pirita, CVPM, joins Dr. Andy Roark to discuss a question from the mailbag! Our listener has an employee who has a… dramatic… personal life. The continuous sharing of personal information and challenges is taking a toll on the team overall. Can this person be coached to change his/her behavior? Or is the genie out of the bottle for good? Let's get into it!
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Episode Transcript
Andrew Roark:
Welcome everybody to the Uncharted Veterinary Podcast. I am your host, Dr. Andy Roark. Guys, I am here today with the one and only Maria Pirita, and we are tackling the question from the mailbag. Our listener wants to know, “I have an employee and this person has a, how should we say, dramatic personal life and they are way oversharing that personal life with the rest of the staff and it is causing some issues. Can I talk to this person and make sure that they know we care about them and also, you got to stop?” That's what they're asking. Is this a fixable thing? Is this just something that has gone on too long and now we're stuck with it? I don't know. Let's get into it and find out, shall we?
Speaker 3:
And now, the Uncharted podcast.
Andrew Roark:
And we are back. It's me, Dr. Andy Roark, and the one and only Maria Pirita. Hello, Maria Pirita. How are you?
Maria Pirita :
I'm good. How are you doing Andy Roark?
Andrew Roark:
I am so good. I am trying not to live in a shadow of jealousy because you just got back from the VHMA conference where you got your official CVPM certification. And I see pictures from this and there's a picture of all these people who were all dressed professionally and standing at attention. And then there's you with this huge grin and you're doing finger guns, and I'm just like, ah, what a ham. And so you were clearly having a wonderful time and getting accolades. And then today, the VHMA Manager-to-Manager podcast comes out and somebody sent it to me and they're interviewing you. And I was like, we are never going to be able to fit her head onto a Zoom call after this week.
Maria Pirita :
It's true.
Andrew Roark:
And so you seem to be living your best life.
Maria Pirita :
I am absolutely living my best life. I have to tell you, I had so much fun at that conference and the podcast that I did with them was actually all about networking. I actually think it came out just in time for the conference, and they might've just shared it on the social media, but it was really fun to do that podcast. Because you know me, I love talking to people. I'm a golden retriever. I will go up to anyone and talk to anyone. That's a big part of networking is just talking to people about what's going on with their life. And so I had a lot of fun doing the podcast, but I'll tell you what, doing the podcast right before going to the conference, it almost geared me up even more. So I was trying even harder than I was trying before to talk to as many people as possible.
And so what happened was that by the time the ceremony happened, I had tons of friends at the conference. And so they were cheering me on. And oh man, that smile, that grin you saw, it was totally real. I could not stop smiling from just ear to ear. Just the excitement because I was really proud of myself for getting it done and getting the pin and everything. But also just being around so many like-minded individuals that also worked really hard for something like this or are currently working really hard towards something like this. And then obviously just the energy of the whole thing. I had tons of fun. So yeah, it is going to be really hard to fit my head in the Zoom because basically I'm a CVPM and I'm awesome.
Andrew Roark:
Talk about being set up for success. It's like hey, let me interview you on networking and now I'm going to release you into this conference. You have been primed to go and make friends. I love it. Meanwhile, in my life, the Uncharted podcast episode where I told Stephanie Goss about discovering Rod Stewart. I've reached the age where I'm now a Rod Stewart fan. That came out last week, and I cannot tell you how many texts about Rod Stewart, featuring Rod Stewart, Rod Stewart gifts, Rod Stewart emails, Rod Stewart lyrics I have been emailed and texted in the last week.
Maria Pirita :
That's amazing.
Andrew Roark:
People really enjoyed this new phase of my life. And so while you're racking up accolades. I'm getting lots of wake up, Maggie, I think I've got something to say to you voicemails.
Maria Pirita :
Oh, yeah. I actually didn't know who that was until that episode.
Andrew Roark:
Oh my God.
Maria Pirita :
I had to look him up. And then I was like-
Andrew Roark:
Are you serious?
Maria Pirita :
Yes.
Andrew Roark:
Goss and I were joking. We were like, there's young people who don't know who this is, ha, ha, ha. I didn't know it was you.
Maria Pirita :
Hold on. Hold on. Let's state the fact that I didn't know English until I was six. And then even then so, a lot of the music was in Spanish for many years. So there's a pass. I am in my mid-30s.
Andrew Roark:
Yeah. Okay. Okay. Okay. You got me there. Okay. I'm going to take comfort in that.
Maria Pirita :
Yeah, there's a little comfort in that.
Andrew Roark:
Oh, man. Let's do some work here. Let's go to the mailbag. We got a good one today.
Maria Pirita :
We do have a really good one. The mailbag question for today is something that I resonate with, and I'll tell you why after I share the question. But it is all about how to get the person who overshares on your team to still feel loved and support without having them tell the whole team all the details of their drama. And so essentially, this person has a bit of a train wreck personal life, and so they're just genuinely oversharing with their team and it can really bring down the team. They're sick of hearing about all the drama.
And so the team themselves, they'd rather have this person stop oversharing, but they also want to make sure that she feels loved and supported throughout the whole thing. And it was signed sincerely, is the genie out of the bottle for good? I love how they signed it. But the reason why I resonate with that is because I can be an oversharer. And so it was one of those things when I read this, I was like, oh yeah, this is going to be a great conversation. Just because I understand how it feels to be almost on both sides of that spectrum of being the person that either overshares or being somebody who people overshare with you. And so I'm excited to dive into this. Yeah.
Andrew Roark:
No. Well, let's get into it and break it down as we do. So let's start with head space. So we're going to try to help our listener. She says, “Hey, we've got this employee. They're oversharing. The team is tired of it. Their personal life is a train wreck. What do we do?” So where do you go with head space? Do you think about why this happens? How do you start to get your head around how you're going to approach this?
Maria Pirita :
For me, the first thing that I always want to think about is exactly what kind of oversharing we're talking about. Because I think that there are some things that are like, this is a big deal, and there are things that are like, I don't need to know what you're doing every single time you go to this one place. And so for me, head space wise, I want to really put this on a spectrum of what are we talking about oversharing with? Because if it's something that's going to require a lot of empathy and support, then that's actually a very serious thing that I'm actually going to have to need to have more empathy towards. And so we're going to have to be a little bit more delicate about the situation.
But sometimes oversharing can seriously be like I used to have … This is a good example of a bit smaller scale, but when I first took over a clinic that didn't have the greatest culture when it came to calling in, as in they had sick time, PTO time that they could use, but they didn't feel comfortable using it. So they would often overshare the reason they were calling in for, and it could be a smaller thing where it was like, I don't feel well. And now they're describing to me every single thing of why they're not feeling well. And I'm like, “Listen, I don't need pictures. Can you please not share those things?”
Andrew Roark:
Like I believe you. I believe that you don't feel good. It's okay.
Maria Pirita :
For that, it's a different situation because I knew that that stemmed from a little bit of a fear of calling in and them having to feel like they needed to prove that they were really sick. And so the way that we're going to approach that is going to be a little bit different. There's going to be some empathy required for them to understand, “Hey, I definitely want to know when you're sick and you're not feeling well and you're calling in. You don't have to feel like you need to prove anything to me.” In fact, tell me uncomfortable with a text message, which a lot of managers are not. A lot of managers are like, “You need to call me and you need to sound sick.” And I'm like, “Nope. Your sick time is your sick time. You don't need to prove anything to me. Your personal time is your personal time. I'm fine if you text me and just let me know you're not coming in.” I think really figuring out what kind of a deal this is that we're talking about. Because they did say it's a train wreck of a personal life. And so that makes me wonder what resources does this person need? How much empathy or support does this person need before we move on?
Andrew Roark:
So I'm going to dovetail right off of that because I completely agree. I think starting with … Seek first to understand. We talk about that a lot. Okay. What is their position? But then the other thing is that dovetails into this next mental exercise for me. It's, what is the problem with this? Meaning what exactly is the fallout? And we're going to need that because when we go and talk to this person … And we want to talk a little bit about what is happening here? What is the downside of the behavior that they have? If you can't say to somebody, “Hey, when you do this behavior, this is the impact it has on the team.” It's really hard to give them feedback. And I think that when we talk about oversharing and especially personal lives and stuff like that, a lot of people go, “Ooh, I just don't like it and the team is tired of hearing about it.” And I go, okay. I hear that. In professional language, what does that translate to?
Because it's one thing … If I sat you down and was like, “Hey, Maria, the team is really tired of hearing about your personal life, but we care about you, but also we're tired of it.” That may be true. I think it'd be a whole lot easier for me to sit you down and say, “Hey, Maria, we're not able to get enough things done in the day. Things are not moving slow. We're not being very efficient because we've got too much chatter on the team and we're doing too much socializing.” Either way, whether I say, hey, look, we're doing too much socializing, talking about non-work stuff and it's slowing the team down or I say, hey, we're just tired of hearing about your personal life, if I can get you to change your behavior the same in both of those approaches, one of them is much more likely to make you feel valued and cared about than the other.
I'm not trying to mislead anybody, but I want to stop and quantify what's the problem here? Do people feel like we're gossiping? Is that where we're going? Do people feel like there's just constant talk about non-work-related stuff? Do they feel like they're being distracted and pulled away from their work because they want to be a good listener for you? And that's very different from we're sick of hearing about your ish to, hey, people really want to support you and so when you start to talk to them about your personal life, they're trying to give you their full attention, but that's stopping them from being able to get their stuff done. And now they're starting to feel guilty about letting you down and they're falling behind and it's causing them a lot of stress. Isn't that a much softer, nicer way to approach this then just say, hey, we're tired of hearing about your stuff?
And so anyway, start to break that down as far as what are the outcomes of this behavior? Because whenever we give feedback, whenever we coach, whenever we start to hold people accountable, we want to talk about this is what the problem is, and I would like it to not be, we're just sick of your voice. That's not where we're trying to go. I don't get the impression … Because this person, when they write, they're like, “We want this person to know that they're cared about. We do care about them. And this behavior has got to stop.” And so just taking that head space to dig into it. I think a lot of times with oversharing people struggle to articulate what the problem is. It's just that's not appropriate. This is stuff that we don't care about or doesn't affect us. And I go, yep. Go one step beyond that and what does the impact of this sharing have on the team, because that's how we're going to frame this up in a professional way versus we're sick of hearing about your stuff.
Maria Pirita :
Yeah. I love that you said that because I think it's also a lot more actionable to really look at it from that way. And I'll tell you, because when I was little in first and second grade … So I'll tell you the story of my parent-teacher conferences. When I was little in first grade, surprise, surprise, the teacher told my mom that I talked too much in class.
Andrew Roark:
No.
Maria Pirita :
Yes she did. And that was the only remark because beyond that I was a perfect student. So the following year in first grade … I swear. I'm not even making that up. That's true.
Andrew Roark:
Okay. I thought that was the punchline. No. Okay. Sorry.
Maria Pirita :
No. That was actually true. That was not a punchline. I was beyond that a perfect student. According to this teacher, according to this one. I kissed butt a lot in school to the teachers all right, Andy. I'm not going to lie.
Andrew Roark:
Okay.
Maria Pirita :
So they all loved me. And then in first grade, the feedback that the teacher had was like, “Yeah, Maria's great. She's pays attention in class, does well. She just doesn't talk to anyone.” And I was like, “Oh, so now I'm getting in trouble because I don't talk to anyone.” Legitimately, I wasn't talking to many people. And then I was like, okay. So then the following year in third grade, the remark was, “Hey, Maria's a great student, but she has a problem with talking too much and she talks to everyone and we can't focus.” And so I kept doing this … I remember being a student and doing this correcting and over correcting and then under correcting and over correcting, and I could never really get it right. So the problem wasn't that I talked too much or too little. The problem was that I used it at an inappropriate time. So I was talking too much during work stuff when I shouldn't have.
And so I think it took me a really long time as a child to learn that because nobody really showed me when you're supposed to talk and when you're not supposed to talk when it came to school. And so finally by around fifth grade, I got it right. So thanks for that. But what I really like about what you just said is it reminds me of that because you're absolutely right. It's not just like, “Hey, we don't want to hear about your situations, or this is too much drama, we don't want to hear about it.” And I think if you told somebody that it can be very confusing and they could be like, “Oh, well, we care about you, but we don't want to hear about all this drama.” I'm going to hear you don't really care about me. You're just saying you care about me so that you don't seem like a jerk, but really you don't want me to talk at all.
And that would cause me to over correct, and then I would not share any of my personal life with anyone for the fear that nobody genuinely wants to hear about it. And so I think putting it in the way that you just said was really focusing in on the reason why. So we're not getting work done. I need to focus on the clients, or maybe the negativity can bring me down. Whatever it is, getting it actionable I think is what really struck me about that.
Andrew Roark:
Yeah. Thanks for saying that. I think you're spot on. It is very hard to say we care about you and we don't want to hear about the things that you care deeply about. That's a hard balance to work. And so we need to try to figure out how do we communicate what the issue is and try to get this person to self-correct. Let me just step back. And I always try to answer our listeners' questions and we are going to answer this question. And I try not to go, well, let's think about what we could have done in the past that would've been helpful because the past is gone. But I got to throw out, this is one of those problems where the easiest thing is to not let it get to this point.
There's so many people who they want to lean back and they're not really sure how to have the conversation with somebody about their personal life conversations and stuff, so they don't say anything. And then it starts to be a little bit much, but we still don't say anything. And it's like, man, do not wait for this to become a big thing. Use what we call the mention early on, which is just going, “Hey, I know you've been talking a lot about your personal life. I know some of the team is a little bit concerned about some stuff that's going on with you. Are you doing okay? Are you aware of our employee assistance program?” Which I'm a big fan of.
Whenever we have employees who are having personal struggles, mental health challenges, things like that, having something like an EAP, the employee assistance program that you can point to and say, hey, this is a resource, this is here for you, we have this for you, again, it's a nice way of saying we have something to support you. These are action steps and starting to push them in that direction so that you can refer them. Because you are not a therapist, you are not their life coach, you are not their counselor. You are not here to fix their personal life. And I see a lot of people go into that problem.
They're like, “Hey Maria, I'm hearing a lot about what's going on in your personal life. How can we help? How can we support you so that we can get our work done?” And what I'm really trying to say is, how can I get you to not bring this to work? But what you hear is, “Hey, tell me more about your personal life so I can get involved in the action or I can give you advice.” I'm not trying to give you advice on your personal life. I don't want any part of that, but I also don't want tell you, hey, you need to deal with this and I don't have anything to support you. And so the EAP is an nice thing. They're affordable for practices. They're easy to have. It's a nice thing that you can say, here is an action step for you and also, I don't want to continue to wrestle with this at work.
Maria Pirita :
I love that. I love that the EAP system can also help you as a leader too when you're having those situations. Because sometimes when you have this whole, it brings down the whole team. I would want to know who the whole team is. Who's really brought down by somebody sharing their drama. And sometimes you find it might actually not be the whole team. There might be some internal conflict that you don't know that is really there and so sometimes it can annoy some people. And so one thing that I love about EAPs too is that we as managers can also use them for conflict resolution to help them. Call them up and say, “Hey, I have this person who has this problem and as a manager, how can you help me with this?” And so they have resources for us too as managers, but I love it for our team members and our employees.
I love what you just said. I am a big believer in that too, that we're not their therapists and we're not supposed to be over here trying to get involved. But my thing is I am always going to try and give them the resources they need to help with their personal situation. So whether it's the employee assistance program or if I have somebody that's confided in me that they have maybe financial issues, I'm going to refer them to our financial person that takes care of our benefits program. Our financial coach. Whoever it is that we have as a resource, because I'm trying to help without getting immediately involved and that's where a lot of those resources really do come in. And we actually have a lot more than we realize because sometimes we have some of those through our insurance companies as well. Our 401k, our payroll will sometimes have certain benefits that help with our employees. So it's important to know what resources we have, depending on what they mean by train wreck of a personal life, obviously. And then there's also community resources too. There's a lot of community resources available that sometimes are only available in your own personal community when it comes to personal lives and situations. So I like to be able to refer them to somebody that can help.
Andrew Roark:
Yeah. I think that's really important when we start dealing with people's personal lives. You can be supportive of them by referring them to a resource. And I think that you can take the bull by the horns as manager, as a leader and say, “Hey, this is what we have, these are the things that I recommend.” So you're not telling them to shut up. You're telling them, hey, we want to actually address this issue and try to support you. Anyway, I found that to be a really effective way to communicate to people I do care and also we've got a job to do and I'm going to make sure you get the resources you have and we're going to move forward. And if they don't care enough or they're not in a place to utilize those resources, again, that's totally their choice, but it's not okay to continue to come and bring that stuff to work and then not take advantage of resources that are being put forward.
We talk a lot about building trust before you need it. One of the core tenets in effectively leading people is having a trusting relationship. And in order to have that, you have to know your people and they have to know you. And so this is one of those things too, just to jump back in time a little bit. Like, hey, it's really helpful if we talked about this earlier rather than later after it becomes the big established pattern. The other thing, it's always helpful to know your people. And it sounds again from our writer that they have got a good culture and that they know each other. And so it's a whole lot easier to have these conversations when you know this person than it is when you really don't know them and now you're telling them that they need to figure out their personal life somewhere else at another time.
And so that's just a reminder. Always be laying that groundwork of knowing the people that you lead and that you manage. And again, having those conversations. Just figure out who they are as people. Know their hobbies. Know their families. Know what they care about. And then if you can have that level of trust, then when you bring them in and say, “Hey, I got to talk to you about something that's going on. I know that you're struggling in your personal life and you're bringing these things in and this is the impact that it's having on the rest of the team.” That's a much easier conversation to have if you and I have some relationship than when you and I don't have much of a relationship and I don't know much about you and you don't know much about me.
Maria Pirita :
Yeah. I really agree with that 100%. And also easier to bring up if you have something that you're already doing or meeting regularly with. Andy, you and I meet regularly for one-on-ones, and so it feels like a really safe space where we get to talk about what's going on with the business, with what we have going on with the podcast, with webinars, what have you. And so I think that this is something that trying to figure out, okay, this person is oversharing with the regular team, but does she have an area in which she can share perhaps part of the personal life that's affecting her work? If for some reason I had like, oh, hey Andy, I have a situation in which maybe a family member is moving in due to health concerns and I need to share it with you. And so just to let you know, I might be harder to get ahold of within the next couple of weeks, but it'll be done by this time.
I feel like not only do we have a spot where I can feel like I trust you enough to say that because you're such a great leader, Andy, but also because we meet regularly to discuss things. And so I think that's another thing is what are we offering our teams in the sense of … Not saying that you have to be their therapist, but that you do have a space where those things can be brought up versus maybe she's oversharing because she's trying to bring up the fact that she's got a lot going on in her life, but she doesn't know how to bring it up to management. And so instead she's bringing it up to everybody else on the team just so that everybody else knows that she might be coming in a little late because she has this personal thing. That's what I'm getting at is what system do we have in place to be able to bring that up if it's going to be affecting our work?
Andrew Roark:
Yeah. I really like that. I think that's so insightful. Yeah. The open door policy, the ongoing communication, easy way to bring up. But it's funny when you say that. I had not even thought about the idea that maybe we're having all of this talk because this person's insecure. They're like, “Hey, I know I'm distracted. I am worried about making mistakes.” And I'm not trying to make excuses, but I want those people to understand, hey, if you see these behaviors, this is what's going on with me. And there's just a lot of people who, they have a lot of guilt if they don't feel like they're at 100% or they don't want anyone to think they're not trying to pull their weight or things like that, and so they overshare.
So it goes back to that whole start with why. What's going on? What's driving this behavior? I think that that type of investigation, it requires a little bit of subtlety. And again, it really makes it a lot easier if you have a good relationship with your people. But I think you're spot on with that. The last part of head space for me, where I want to get my head into this going in is remember, it is not your job as a leader, as a manager to make people happy. Now, that doesn't mean we don't care about people. It is your job to balance the needs of the people and the patients and the clients and the business. And so you've got to keep all those things in balance. And to me, that just helps me mentally because I'm like, I'm going to go have to have this hard conversation with Maria. I feel this great weight and pressure to talk to Maria, but I don't want to hurt Maria's feelings because I know that I care about her and I want her to know that our team cares about her.
I put all this personal weight on this conversation of what's going to happen between the two of us. And just for me, it's so much easier if I step out and go, you know what? I am the messenger here and I need to balance Maria's needs against the needs of the rest of the team and also against the needs of the clients and also against the needs of the patients who need care. And so we're going to go have this conversation in that larger context. It just puts everything in balance and perspective, and it makes it a whole lot easier to say, hey, this is what's going on and this is what other people are dealing with and this is what our patients need and we need to talk about how this behavior fits into that balance.
And it's not just we're having this conversation because I am tired of hearing about your personal life. It's like, no, there's this much larger thing going on and I'm trying to find this balance. So anyway, that seek balance is always something I want to put into my mind whenever I have hard interpersonal conversations coming up. It gives you a healthier perspective and helps you zoom out and not just look at the one person you have to have the hard conversation with, but look at everybody involved and saying, okay, it's suddenly a whole lot clearer what needs to happen and why it needs to happen.
Maria Pirita :
Yeah. And I love that you said that too because I think sometimes us as managers, we do feel very much that we have to … It's hard for us to have these conversations because we feel like, oh, we have to take care of our team and how am I taking care of them if I'm having to have to have this type of conversation. But really frame it in the perspective of balancing those needs that this is the better thing for the team as a whole is to have this conversation. Because I think a lot of times that's the problem with any difficult conversation is that we don't have it because we don't want to upset somebody in the process. But then this tiny little no big deal thing turns into a very big deal because now you've let it go on for so long. And so I think that that's a really smart thing for us to remember as the people who are having to have this conversation and so that we hopefully don't feel as like, oh, I'm a bad leader for telling somebody that they can't share their personal life. You know what I mean? It's not that at all, and it's important to keep that in mind. And so I love that you said that.
Andrew Roark:
Well, that balanced perspective. That definitely pushes me to have the conversation earlier too. You're exactly right. If I don't think of that way and I'm just like, well, it doesn't bother me that much, and so I'm going to let it go, I tend to let it go a lot longer than I do. If I go, hey, this is impacting five other people who are all working at the front desk or five of the other techs, the doctors are starting to roll their eyes. Yes, it's a low grade annoyance, but all these people are having it and that's not worth it. And so I'm going to step in and have this conversation when everybody's slightly annoyed as opposed to, I've got a lot of people who are really just sick and tired of this behavior and now I'm going to have to go and have a much bigger conversation. So that whole balance perspective. As someone who doesn't really love conflict, as somebody who likes to be nice and sees himself as a kind person that-
Maria Pirita :
You are a kind person.
Andrew Roark:
Well, thank you. I can sit back too long. And so that balance perspective, that's pushed me for that. So anyway, that's what I got for heads pace. Anything else you want to add to that?
Maria Pirita :
No. I think that that's what I've got too. I think we hit them all.
Andrew Roark:
All right, cool. Let's take a little break and then we'll come back and we'll do our action steps.
Stephanie Goss:
Hey, everybody. If you are a practice owner or a practice manager, listen up because I've got something for you. If you're not in one of those roles, take a quick break from whatever you're doing and we'll be right back with the podcast. But if you are, I don't want you to miss out because our Practice Leader Summit is happening in December in Greenville, South Carolina in person and registration is going to be closing. In fact, it is closing on November the 7th, 2023. And if you have not signed up and you have been on the fence, I'm going to give you a little bit of incentive. I'm going to share a coupon code here for you and I want you to use it because I want to see you there.
So Practice Leaders Summit is all about working on our practices, not in them. And this year we are taking practice owners and practice managers specifically, and we are hoping to bring them all together and let them spend some time separately. So practice owners working with other practice owners, managers working with other managers because the challenges we face in those roles are so unique. And so we need time and space to be able to work together with our peers and collaborate because no one knows what life is like for us in the clinic better than our peers. And so we're going to do that. And then we're going to bring everybody together. So if you come together with your practice owner, let's say as practice manager or vice versa, we're going to spend time working on your practice. But don't fear because if you come by yourself, you will still get the opportunity to work with practice owners or practice managers in small groups so that you can spend the time at the end of the conference really working with myself and Andy and Maria and the rest of the Uncharted team, working our way through what do we really want 2024 to be about for our practices?
And so we're going to tackle some of the big topics. I'm super pumped about this. So we would love to see you there. And I've got a special code for our Uncharted podcast listeners. So if you go to uncharted.com/events and you sign up before the November 7th deadline for PLS and you use this code, it is SG for Stephanie Goss, UVC. So SGUVC20. You will get $20 off your registration for Practice Leader Summit. So if you've been on the fence, if you've been waffling, I haven't shared this on the podcast yet, but I'm throwing it out there, go to unchartedvet.com/events, sign up for the registration. You can use the code to get it for yourself. You can get it for you and your practice owner or you and your practice manager. But sign up because I want to see you there. And now back to the podcast.
Maria Pirita :
Okay.
Andrew Roark:
All right.
So we're in good head space. We've thought about what are the drivers of this behavior? Start with why. Where is this behavior coming from? We seek first to understand. All those cliched phrases about understanding what's driving this behavior. And then we started to dig into what are the actual outcomes that we're seeing so that we can go and say, this is the outcome that is coming out of your behavior. Not just people don't want to hear about it, people are tired of it, but what are the negative effects of this behavior so we can coach that? And we've thought about that stuff. We talked about looking at it from a balanced perspective. We talked about knowing what our resources are and are there things that we can go and hand off to this person. So we're not saying, “Hey, I know you're struggling. You need to keep it to yourself.” It's not that. But also I'm not your therapist and I don't want to be your therapist and that's not my job and I'm not taking that on, so don't bring it to me, but I'm going to give you some resources and I can get you access to a therapist or whatever through our EAP or through other resources that we have.
So we've got all those ducks in a row. So I think having that stuff is really important. When we actually go to have the conversation … So is the genie out of the bottle for good? You never know, right? I cannot say, if you say this to this person, their behavioral will change. I don't know. I think that usually when we have behaviors that get started and build up slowly over time, one of the mistakes I see people make … And maybe you can pull it off. I've never been able to pull it off. It's really hard to just subtly walk that back. Meaning start giving people subtle negative reinforcement and change that behavior.
Once that behavior is established, to me, you have to do what I call the reset. And the reset is when you bring the person in and say, “Hey, this is what's going on. We need to make some changes and we're going to start today.” And then we can start to give positive reinforcement. We can start to give negative reinforcement it see behaviors. A lot of times if people have been doing something and behaving a certain way for a long time and then you just start giving negative reinforcement or saying, hey, stop that, they're confused. They don't really get it. They don't understand where this pushback is coming from. You need to do a reset conversation. So the first action step for me is it's time to bring this person in. It's time to have a reset conversation. It's time to ask them about what happened, why this behavior is coming up as opposed to in the past. And it may just be that their personal life has spun out of control.
We need to talk to them about what exactly they're doing that's bothering the team. Because to your point, I thought it was a really good story about first I talked too much and then so I was told that was not right so then I talked not at all. It's not this person talking. It's probably not this person sharing. It's definitely not this person being themselves or being their authentic selves. It's not those things. It is a specific behavior and we need to try to make clear what that behavior is so this person is not confused. So when I bring you in and go, “Hey, Maria, I just need you to just take it down a couple of notches.” You don't know what that means. That's terrible if you … Or, “Hey, it's the talking. It's just the talking.” That's really confusing feedback. It's Not specific. It's not really actionable in a way that matters.
Again, I'm not trying to make this person feel unwanted. I need to get surgical in what exactly is the problem so that you can see it and isolate it. And then we're going to have to start to talk about the impacts that problem has on the team So they go, “Oh, I understand how my behavior is causing these effects.” And then lastly, we're going to talk about our resources and how we're going to change our behavior. And oftentimes that means maybe trying to get this person some support if possible in a healthy way.
Maria Pirita :
Yeah. I really like that and I really liked how you said really addressing that behavior, which is really, really important in that conversation. Things like sharing … When you talk to us about this, it makes us feel this way or just really having that focus on the behavior and the action steps on how we can correct it or where it might be the appropriate place because that's going to give me something to actually work on, like you said, versus just not sharing my personal life at all because now I think you guys don't care about me.
Andrew Roark:
Let's role play this. People always like if we try to use some language and things. And like I said, there's no right way to say this. You got to figure out what sounds good in your voice. Let's you and me do this real fast. So let's come up real quick with … What is the behavior? Let's think about this. So what could oversharing look like? What I want to get at is what does this conversation sound like? You know what I mean? And so what is something that an employee would be doing? What does this oversharing look like?
Maria Pirita :
Yeah. As in, oh man, Andy, I had a great weekend, although it was really hard because my car broke down and then also then my husband was getting mad at me for the car breaking down like it was my fault.
Andrew Roark:
Okay, cool. So fighting-
Maria Pirita :
Fighting with the husband.
Andrew Roark:
Yeah. I love it.
Maria Pirita :
I feel like those, and then talking about the reasons why you were fighting with your husband. I think we hear a lot of the personal life like that at home. Drama amongst there usually. We can make up a scenario with that too.
Andrew Roark:
Yeah. Well, let's just start with that. And then I would say, what is the specific behavior that … So what is the outcome of that? Is it a time suck? Is it emotional fatigue? Is it conflict that's being brought to the team and they're getting conflict fatigue? When we start to look at that behavior, what would that feel like?
Maria Pirita :
Yeah. I think the emotional impact that it has on your team is going to be one because if you're bringing down negativity a lot. And then also the efficiency piece. We had one time a receptionist who liked to overshare with clients, and that gave us an unprofessional setting. So that was-
Andrew Roark:
Oh, that's a great one. Yeah. So let's you and me … I'm going to give you the talk and just sort of say how I'd set it up, and then I want you to come back and I want you to fix it, critique it, tell me how you would go at it differently. Sound good? Okay, cool. So I'd say something like, “Hey Maria, thanks for coming in. I wanted to talk to you a little bit. You and I have been hanging out for a long time and I've known you a long time. I can't help but notice over the last couple of weeks you are having a lot of conversations with me and with other members of the staff about conflict that you're having with your husband. And so I'm hearing a lot.”
And say, “I care about you. You're a friend of mine. The rest of the team, they love you and they care about you as well. And so I know everybody wants to be supportive, but we're getting to the point where it's definitely happening pretty regularly and when we're having these conversations and this team is hearing about conflict again and again, they internalize that conflict. They care about you and they're hearing about you in these arguments or these fights, and it doesn't sound like you're always being treated fairly and it takes an emotional toll on them and they don't know how to help and I don't really know how to help. But it's something that I'm worried about people really feeling and carrying with them.
“The other thing is that when you come in and tell these stories, people want to give you their full attention and they want to be present with you. And we're just so busy. I know that people struggle to be able to get their work done and also feel like they're giving you full attention, but then also the phones are ringing and clients are coming in and they've got patients that they're working on and things like that. And so I think people are starting to feel a little bit trapped of, I really want to give my full attention to the patient and also really want to be there for Maria. And so I think that that's really hard on them.
“The last part is when clients are around and they hear these conversations, they look to us to be these magical professionals that know everything and take perfect care of their pets and it doesn't match up. It seems like a possible distraction from the care that their pet is getting and things like that. And of course, I'm not saying it's unimportant and you know that, but I do worry about an unprofessional appearance just with them hearing one of our team members talking about personal life stuff while we're taking care of their pet.
“And so I just want to talk to you about this stuff and say, this is the behavior that I'm seeing. This is how it's affecting the team. I want to make sure that you're supported. And so I want to ask you, is there anything that we can do? Do you have support outlets? Have you looked at our employee assistance program? I don't know if that would be valuable, but if it is valuable, I want you to know that it's there. Things like that. But how can we support you without having these effects on the team and to make people be able to continue to show up and make this be a positive place to be? Because I want this to be a refuge where you can come and have a great experience and feel supported and cared about, and I want to make sure that we protect that experience for other people while still being honest about people having a hard time sometimes and we all struggle. So anyway, talk to me a little bit about what's going on and how we can maybe support you in a positive, productive way.”
Maria Pirita :
Wow. That's great.
Andrew Roark:
That's how I would … And again, you hear me just making it up and I'm talking off the cuff.
Maria Pirita :
Yeah. I love that.
Andrew Roark:
That's what it would sound like as I start to try to open this conversation up. What do you think? What could I do better? What seemed to work well? What are your thoughts?
Maria Pirita :
I felt genuinely supported during that. You did a great job at framing it from, like we talked about, the behavior and the support and really caring about, I still want to care and support you. And I love the actual steps that that's where you ended because that's where my brain focused towards the end, not as much on the other things. But really focusing on the actionable steps. The only thing that I would add in that conversation would be to frame more about why it's important for them to use EAP.
And I may even say something of like, “When we talk about these things at work, not only does the team feel bad because they're not giving you the time because they're trying to struggle, but you also deserve to have an unbiased party give you that information because we all love you and we're going to give you the best advice that we can, and we're going to talk to you about those things. But at the same time, I really do think that you owe it to yourself to have that unbiased party, and you're only going to get that through the EAP, and so it's going to be something that's really going to help you work through it in more actionable steps than us trying to help you in the middle of this appointment.” And so trying to really focus it from what would they get out of using the program kind of thing.
Andrew Roark:
I love your phrase. Oh, I think you owe it to yourself. I was like, oh, that's so good. You know what I mean? And it's true. You've got this opportunity. You've got the support. There's things that you can do. If it's bothering you this much, you owe it to yourself to get serious about what you're going to do, not just to talk to whoever is not fast enough to get out of the room before you start to unload on them. You know what I mean?
Maria Pirita :
Yeah.
Andrew Roark:
But I love that wording. When we do examples like this, it's always a balance of I want to try to get it out into the world. It's like, this is what I would say. And at the same time, I don't want to monologue at this person. You know what I mean?
Maria Pirita :
Right, mmm-hmm.
Andrew Roark:
And so it's that balance of reading their body language, seeing how they're feeling, checking in. I think you're totally right about having to unpack more of what that EAP experience looks like. I would not drop that in the initial monologue. You know what I mean?
Maria Pirita :
Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Andrew Roark:
I want to check in with them and then if they have questions or if they start to tell me if they're on board with that, if that sounds reasonable, then I'll start to lay out more of these are the resources that we have or this is what that can look like. But no, I think you're spot on about before we go too much farther, we do need to flesh out a little bit more what that support looks like. But again, I do think it's really important to get their input on what support is valuable for them. Because I don't know what they need, and I don't want to be presumptuous and say, “Oh, I hear what's going on. Let me tell you that this is the best thing that you can do, and here it is.” And yeah.
Maria Pirita :
I think you're spot on in what you just told the audience in the way that we role played it. It's going to be different because I felt the moments in which you were talking in which you would've stopped and asked … There was a specific question. I just want to talk to you about that. What do you think we could do about something like this? I feel like that would've been a moment in which I would've stopped and been like, “Oh, well, I have some ideas about this.” Because you're right, the solution to the problem is always going to be better if it comes from them. And so I think it's different when we're role playing it here in the podcast because the conversation's going to be different, but I think the approach you went was just super solid and just the way that you framed it. Yeah.
Andrew Roark:
It's one of those things too where taking a little bit of time to do this right, and to have this conversation is going to pay such huge dividends later on. Don't rush it. Sitting down. Pick your time. Pick your location. I don't want this to feel like they're in trouble. I don't want to do this at the end of the day when they're exhausted and they're hungry. I want to try to do this at a time when I can get some good head space. We've all had hard conversations when we are not up for a hard conversation, and that is really, really challenging. We have also had hard conversations when people are open to hearing what we're talking about and had it go really well. And again, we've got a limited amount of control because we can't control other people, but we can at least try to be a little bit strategic about how we're going to do this and when we're going to do it and things like that. How do you pick your time for this conversation, Maria? Say how we're going to do it, when we're going to do it. People always ask me, they're like, “Do you tell the person you're going to have this conversation? Do you book time on the calendar? Do you not? Do you just ask them to come in?” Talk to me a little bit about when you would have this conversation.
Maria Pirita :
I think you're spot on. I would hate to do it at the end of the day. I feel like what you're going to find is it's going to be stuck on the end of the day. You're going to mull it over. You're going to think about it a lot. And I want to be there to control any afterthoughts, because we all have afterthoughts that are sometimes driven by anxiety of like, oh, this or that. I want to be able to control those afterthoughts. So I want to have it not at the end of the day for sure. This is where I was talking about why I love having a regular cadence for discussing regular one-on-ones and talking about having this designated time, because then it's not a surprise, and it's like this is our regular one-on-one cadence that we talk about whatever we need to talk about. What's going on at home, work, whatever, and having that space because then it's not going to feel daunting.
I think one of the biggest mistakes we can make as leaders is say to employees like, “Hey, I need to talk to you for a minute.” Because for some reason, that can be the scariest phrase when you're a manager, and it can actually be the scariest phrase when coming from your employees. Because sometimes they tell you, I need to talk to you, and your brain will immediately go like, “Oh, great. This person's going to quit.”
We have to be careful with the, I need to talk to you because some of us have experiences in the past that can be that. So I try to avoid saying, I need to talk to you, and if I'm ever going to have a meeting like this. And I do try to make sure we have time for it. And so I'll say more like, “Hey, I set some time for us to meet at this time.” And so that way it's more like, hey, we're going to meet at this time. Low stakes. They're not going to be worried about, oh, what are we going to talk about? Hey, we're just meeting up and talking. So I think that that's really important to me. I think time-wise, it's usually going to be sometime in the morning to mid-afternoon when it's not going to be so crazy for my team. But that's because that's when it wasn't so crazy for my team. Every clinic's going to be a little different, I think.
Andrew Roark:
Yeah. No, I agree. I agree with all that. It's a mistake to set this thing up in a way if you can avoid it where they're like, “Oh my gosh, we're having a meeting tomorrow, and they won't tell me what it's about.” I always think that that's bad. It's much more problematic. If this is a doctor who's got an appointment schedule and you're like, oh man, they're in appointments. This is not a conversation that you want to squeeze between appointments. This is not a, hey, can I talk to you real quick? Because if they come back and they're like, “Hey, I've got some serious stuff going on. I'm really struggling. I think I'm getting pretty depressed.” You don't want to be like, “Well, I'm sorry to hear that. I'm sorry I got to go. There's an appointment waiting for you, and I don't think you should miss it.” You definitely don't want that.
I completely agree. If you have regular meeting times, if this is one of your direct reports, if you're a medical director, it's really nice to have standing meetings with doctors. This is also one of those things where if it's been going on for a long time, which is where we are now, this is not a thing where you have to race and fix it this afternoon. And it's funny how long there'll be a pattern of behavior that's been going on for six months and people are like, “That's it. We're fixing this. Where is she?” And it's like, man it's been six months. What are you doing? Why is this a thing you have to do before you go home today? Just make the decision and stick to it. You're not bailing on this, but also go home and sleep on it. Think about what you're going to say. Go through the exercises we talked about, figuring out fallout and the questions we're going to ask and stuff like that. And then it's worth it to keep your cadence and bring this person in and talk to them in a low stakes environment. I think that's really good.
If this is somebody like a CSR or a tech or an assistant, somebody you can pull off the floor, make sure that you've got time and you are not going to be distracted. But if this is not someone that you regularly meet with or things like that, I do think that you can do that, “Hey, have you got a couple of minutes? I want to talk to you about something.” And just pull them that way. I can be on board with that because I think the anticipation of the conversation can really terrify people. Especially if you do your best to keep it low stakes in the room and make sure that they don't feel like they're in trouble. But again, that breaks down when you're talking about doctors who have appointments and there's people waiting on them. It's much harder to get those people.
Maria Pirita :
Or if it's like a receptionist that's in charge of the phones, what are you going to do with the phones? Because in my years of receptioning, I remember getting anxiety sometimes when I would get pulled from the floor, but all they did was forward the phones because that just meant I had a bunch of messages to come back to. So really thinking about if you are going to do the casual thing, put somebody at the desk to just help out. Put somebody in the back to do it. Or if you have time because you actually have decided to schedule it, you have the ability to schedule to have more hands that you need so that you don't have to be pulling somebody and it's going to be a great dire need situation. But yeah.
Andrew Roark:
That's all I got. I feel like that's the best shot. Does the genie go back into the bottle? I don't know. I think it depends on why this is an issue. It depends on what's going out. It depends on what kind of positive and negative feedback this person's been getting from the rest of the team. Yeah. It just depends on a lot of factors. We can't make people change their behaviors. We can talk to them about it. We can coax them to change. We can coach them to change. But ultimately this has got to be something that they've got to want. We've all seen employees that just can never break the habit of … Some people just love drama. They let it into their lives. They seem to thrive on it and feed on it. You can coach those people. We can make our team a place that drama just doesn't get much of a foothold. There are things like that that we can do. But we can't guarantee that the genie goes back in the bottle.
But my big advice is have the big conversation. And the last thing I want to say is this. You're going to have the conversation we just talked about. That is not the beginning, middle, and end of our treatment plan. That is the beginning of the treatment plan. And then we're going to stay engaged. And when this person comes the next day and we don't hear anything about the personal life and they've got a good attitude, I want you to jump in there with the positive reinforcement. Call it out. Say to them, at the end of the day, “Hey, I want you to know I see you. I see you working hard. I know you're carrying a lot, but boy, you were an absolute joy to be around today and I know that it meant a lot to the rest of the … For having your head in the game here and for showing up the way that you did.” So remember to jump in positively reinforce. If after a couple of weeks it starts to slip, which is often the case is the behavior will get better for a couple of weeks and if and when it starts to come back, because it often does, be there just to have the quick mention. Don't wait until it gets back bad enough that you have to have another closed door conversation. Say something sooner rather than later.
Say, “Hey, things have been going really well for the last couple of weeks. I know you've been working through some stuff. You have really been a pleasure to be around. I couldn't help but over here today that we're starting to talk again about conflicts at home. And I'm sorry to hear that. What's going on as far as our commitment to communicating with the team? You can understand my concern is I don't want things to get negative or for us to start backsliding because things have been really, really great. How can I support you?” And it's just trying to mention it in a way like that. Again, a compassionate way. But don't let it go. Just know that people are going to make an effort. They're generally are going to do their best and they're generally going to have some backsliding. And all you got to do is mention to them, “Hey, I heard this. Everything okay?” And a lot of times what happens is that hopefully it helps them know that they're supported. But also it causes attention to the fact that this behavior did happen and I saw it. And so hopefully that's often enough that it takes to get people back on the rails.
Maria Pirita :
Yeah. Yeah. I love it.
Andrew Roark:
Cool. Well, Maria, thanks for being here today. I always appreciate you and your time. Guys, thanks for tuning in. I hope this was helpful for our mailbag listener. Take care of yourselves, everybody.
And that's what we got for you guys. I hope you enjoyed the episode. Thanks to Maria for being here. I always enjoy working with her. She is amazing. Congratulations to her, in all seriousness, on her CVPM. She really is a rising star in our profession, and I feel honored to get to work with her. So anyway, guys, take care of yourselves. Be well. I'll talk to you later on. Bye.
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