Pelvic PT Rising
Pelvic PT Rising
How Nicole Got Fired (And How to Leave a Job Gracefully)
It's the story we've promised to tell, of how Nicole got fired! Well, not technically. Technically her resignation was accepted early, suddenly and without warning ;).
But we tell you the story for a broader point on how to handle an employee transition. Whether you're an employee trying to leave on good terms and do everything right by your (former) employer and patients, or a clinic owner trying ensure you handle a transition with grace, this 'sode will have helpful strategies for you.
We tackle the thorny topics of giving notice, managing patient care during the transition, and maintaining professional relationships with current and former employers.
Ultimately, it comes down to maintaining professionalism and being confident you handled your part of any transition with the upmost integrity. Hope it helps!
Pelvic Business Accelerator
If you're looking to take your pelvic rehab business to the next level in 2024, make sure you're looking into the Pelvic Business Accelerator. A new cohort starts in January of 2024!
If you want your business to look different by the end of 2024, you'll have to do something different. Check it out - www.pelvicptrising.com/accelerator
About Us
Nicole and Jesse Cozean founded Pelvic PT Rising to provide clinical and business resources to physical therapists to change the way we treat pelvic health. PelvicSanity Physical Therapy together in 2016. It grew quickly into one of the largest cash-based physical therapy practices in the country.
Through Pelvic PT Rising, Nicole has created clinical courses (www.pelvicptrising.com/clinical) to help pelvic health providers gain confidence in their skills and provide frameworks to get better patient outcomes. Together, Jesse and Nicole have helped 400+ pelvic practices start and grow through the Pelvic PT Rising Business Programs (www.pelvicptrising.com/business) to build a practice that works for them!
Get in Touch!
Learn more at www.pelvicptrising.com, follow Nicole @nicolecozeandpt (www.instagram.com/nicolecozeandpt) or reach out via email (nicole@pelvicsanity.com).
Check out our Clinical Courses, Business Resources and learn more about us at Pelvic PT Rising...Let's Continue to Rise!
In the last 10 years, our field has gone from an unknown specialty to a household name. This brings unprecedented opportunities, but we need to rise up to meet them and give our patients the care that they deserve. In order to help others get better, we need to be better. This podcast will help you to become more confident with your patients, more successful in your practice or business and a leader in pelvic health, and we're going to have some fun along the way. Join us as we rise together. We're Jesse and Nicole Cozin, founders of Pelvic Sanity Physical Therapy and the creators of the Pelvic PT Huddle, and this is Pelvic PT Rising.
Speaker 2:Hey guys, welcome back to another episode of the Pelvic PT Rising podcast with Jesse and Nicole Cozin. Hey, nicole, hey, remember that time you got fired.
Speaker 1:Jesse, I technically did not get fired. My resignation was accepted early and quite immediately, unexpectedly, unexpectedly, in kind of a fucked up way. So I did not get fired, but it sure felt like that.
Speaker 2:Well, we've been promising to tell this story for a while.
Speaker 2:I hope it doesn't disappoint, but this is an interesting story for us.
Speaker 2:It's always an interesting thing to decide for us how much we share about personal stuff and obviously we told you guys a lot about our journey to Clay and IVF and difficult fertility journey and all of that and we never really wanted to come on here and just gratuitously bash a situation but we really did want to talk about. We've gotten a lot of questions about as an owner, how do you let people leave gracefully, how do you do that if you are giving your notice? We have thoughts on that from both the clinic owner side as well as from the clinician side Wanted to get to those. But all of our thinking about that is so informed by this story. There's no way we could talk about that and not actually tell you guys the back story of why we think the way we do and why it's so important trust to be professional with that and why we want people leaving on as good a terms as possible and that all comes down to this story. So we thought we had to dive in. It should also be a little bit entertaining.
Speaker 1:It's going to be pretty entertaining and we're not even going to say the entire story.
Speaker 2:Right For that you'll need to meet Nicole as she's talking at CSM and the Love and Bar, get a couple glasses of wine going. But yes, there is more. But let me give the backdrop. You tell me, nicole, if I miss any of the big, important stuff, but right out of school you had been tasked to start a big program at a big hospital the public health program there, and this person had been your clinical mentor.
Speaker 2:And a lot of times when we talk about the importance of clinical mentorship early in a career, that's part of that influence. For you that was like a hugely important relationship in your professional life. And then, after five years of running that program at the hospital, you had gone over to be her number one employee. When she started a practice Her clinical director had built the place, had run it, had hired folks there I mean really the stabilizing force in that practice. You moved for the job, you moved right next to where she had been, where the job was located. It was a big deal for you to be there and doing that and you guys had known each other for 10 years by the time the events of this story take place. So I just want to give the little bit of the backdrop to what you guys are going to hear.
Speaker 1:Yeah, 10 years, and not just an employee-employee relationship. I mean, families knew each other. It was a big relationship and she's a wonderful clinician and so she had shaped a lot of how I treat, even to this day, with that. So so grateful to her for that and very much not grateful for how this all went down.
Speaker 2:And to be fair though, Nicole, this is something that I think I recognized at the time you were a bad employee.
Speaker 1:I wasn't a bad employee. No, you were a.
Speaker 2:I mean rephrase. You were a very difficult employee, especially for a boss who was not overly secure as a business owner. That is a 1000% true.
Speaker 1:Yes, I think that anybody that goes into their own business was probably not a good employee, and I feel like you don't ever really know that. You can't really see that when you're in it, when you are the employee, because you think you're saving the day, you think you're doing all the things great, you think that you're the one that's the reason why this clinic is running and exists and successful, and the audacity of that allows you to think like, hey, I can do this for myself. I'm going to open my own practice. By extension, you probably had opinions on how things were run and all of that, and so, especially for someone like me who is not afraid to say said opinions to anybody, that makes it difficult.
Speaker 2:So this breakup was probably inevitable. I think a lot of people in your life myself, I would say, included saw this coming before. You did where you really wanted. That's what you wanted. You wanted what she had been promising and running a clinic underneath her and working for her for, I mean, you were imagining that you'd be working for her for decades.
Speaker 1:Oh, for sure.
Speaker 2:And that was kind of the overall situation there. Because of a lot of different things that had kind of gone on and the fact that some promises had not been met there, I think you were getting more and more frustrated. That place kind of operated in a crisis all the time mode, which I feel like in one hand was actually kind of good for you because you really do well in that kind of situation. But that gets to be wearing and burning people out and is not a great long term situation and you were getting pretty frustrated by the time you made the decision to start public sanity.
Speaker 1:What's interesting, too, is that, especially when you put that in the backdrop of I was treating a ton of chronic pelvic pain and so you're starting to feel like really just tapped out just the clinical part and then you get a little bit of a fire and excitement with the potential for your professional career, and then it gets just more and more frustrating when promises that were made to you just aren't met continually, like so many. I can't even describe how many times there was something that was promised. We had a plan, we had a deadline, because I started to implement deadlines and then it just like wasn't met. And so, jesse, this actually came at a time when we'd been together for a while, we knew each other when I was working at Hogue, and then also we had just gotten married.
Speaker 1:We decided to write the IC solution. We had started public sanity as a blog, and you actually were one of the people that was like, um, this is like not working. You're super unhappy. And I don't think I really saw that, because we were fighting all the time around this time as well, and it always came back to this like work stuff. That was kind of cool that we were going to be able to do a bunch of stuff and clinical director this and open a new location. That then it just was never happening and then that was really frustrating.
Speaker 2:So we made the call to start public sanity. You deliberately placed it almost 25, 30 minutes away, which meant it was 25 or 30 minutes away from where you lived, because you'd moved next to the clinic of your boss. But out of respect and wanting to make sure that you know it didn't seem like you were just trying to open something right down the street, put a clinic 25 ish minutes away, literally. Nicole, the moment you signed the lease, the moment the ink was dry, you were really wanted to make sure that you gave her as much notice as humanly possible, also, again, with a little bit of the grandiose thinking that the place was going to fall apart, I think, without you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we'll get to that with the takeaways.
Speaker 2:Yes, but you wanted to give as much notice as possible. I think it ended up being it was at least two months, probably more than that, right. And then you literally told her on the day that you signed the lease for the building of public sanity.
Speaker 1:Yes, Thank you. It was one of those things where I just felt we got in a fight about this, because everybody in my personal life that had any experience giving any notice at all said that like that's way too much time, especially when you're going to open a competing practice, and I was like no, no, no.
Speaker 2:We know this is almost verbatim. We've got such a good relationship. I've known her for 10 years. She might be a little bit shocked but she went out on her own. She knows how it was important it was to her. She's going to be really proud of me. She's going to really be. You know, she mentored me, she did this and she did this and she's going to just be so happy to see me grow and thrive on my own.
Speaker 1:It was like my success is her success.
Speaker 2:Yes, success.
Speaker 1:And I was like this is, it's going to be fine, I'm going to be able. And, plus, too, I had always been able to handle any emotional volatility quite well, and so I was like, even if she does freak out, like I've got this, it's going to be fine. So I went against literally every single person in my life where that was saying like that's too much notice. I felt very strongly about I want to do this right, I want to do right by her, and so I did the. I don't even think the ink was dry, by the way. It's like that that day I signed the lease, public sanity was in stone and I was like, okay, this is the day.
Speaker 2:So the first inkling that things weren't going well in the cold. But you told her that you were going to start a practice, that it was in South Orange County, a fair bit away, that you're giving her this notice, that you're being really generous with all of that stuff, and the response was weird.
Speaker 1:It was like stairs. There was no words, it was just staring. That makes me uncomfortable just hearing that she just like me too, and it was such, so not expected right, I'm expected to either have a good conversation, or even if we were not going to have a great conversation, I still expected something, and it was just words.
Speaker 1:Words like communication communication, human communication, Words that did not happen to the point where I remember being like okay, so I, what I think we should do is here's what I think we should do. I think we should just take the weekend and you can think about stuff, and I will not say a word to anybody. We'll just figure it out together and we'll talk over the weekend and it'll be fine. You can decide what the best course of action is.
Speaker 2:And then you just left.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, it was at the end of my day so I was like okay, bye. And then I remember calling you and you being like, oh, how'd it go, how'd you take it? And I was like I like don't know, it was like a kind of an eerie feeling. It was really weird. But you know, whatever, I'm just like yeah, shoe, shocked, more so than than normal, and just doot, doot, doot, go home, go about my day.
Speaker 1:I feel like at that point I was still going to the gym. Come home to, of course, I was doing my charting, wait late because I had not listened to my own podcast at that time. And I come home and I look at the EMR and my schedule was completely blank. All my patients had moved over, except for two, one at the beginning of the day and one at the end of the day. Everyone had moved over to her, which was on her day off, and I was like, oh shit, this is fucked up because no one had talked to me about it. Just to start it happening, I go on the website. I'm not on the website anymore, so no one has said anything to me, and the thing that was really scary for me actually about that was that I got paid per patient. And so when you start seeing your schedule cleared and you get paid per patient, like that's pretty fucked up without a conversation, and so you know, I started getting like really anxious about like oh God, what's going to happen.
Speaker 2:And then we're thinking, well, they're just going to let you go when you go in, right, we had assumed that there's no other reason to move all the people off. That kind of makes sense. I mean, it's a weird way to do it and not have a conversation, all that. But we're definitely thinking like, hey, you're going to walk in on whatever it was the next day and they're going to just tell you to go home, which they didn't. There was like no communication at all.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:This is the craziest part about that story. So they didn't tell any of the patients and Nicole had nothing to do. So you were literally sitting there in the office and seeing your patients come in, hearing that they're told that they're not seeing you, and you're literally sitting right there in the office.
Speaker 1:The office was super small, like my office was like right there, so, and then you can hear people like getting irritated, you know, at the front, being like why? And then they would come by and see me and I would be like hi, and then at that point we still didn't have the conversation about what I was supposed to say and they're like what's happening? And I was like I don't know, you're going to have to talk to her about that and it was like the most awkward feeling ever that whole day. It was just the worst.
Speaker 2:Now, when did you get demoted? Are you going to tell me you didn't get demoted, that your resignation was accepted halfway early?
Speaker 1:No, here's the deal, and this is where the story is going to get abridged into. I'm just going to list all the things that happened, that did happen, that were quite unbelievable and right. I'm just going to say that because, but in the short span of me giving my notice and then me actually getting my resignation accepted early, the boot again with minimal conversation at this point, when we're coexisting in the same space which is even like so weird.
Speaker 1:No eye contact, zero, no zero, like deliberate eyes averted, and I'm trying to be like cheery and whatever, like professional and normal. It's just not happening. So in that time span when this happened over a few days I don't know chronologically exactly what happens was a while ago, but I was I've already mentioned I was taken off the website. I got an email, I don't forget from who, to turn in my key and my computer. That was issued by the company, even though I was like still seeing patients and I was sometimes the first one in the office. I'm like, well, how am I going to get in If I have to turn in my key? I mean, there was just a bunch of like weird stuff like that.
Speaker 1:So that and then one day, one of the days, I walked in my friends who I had brought over we studied from for the WCS together. I come in, and so I had shared an office with my boss and everyone else was kind of outside this other like little office area, and so I come in and everything in my desk that I'd been had it had for five years, had was moved out into like the non managerial section, and my friend who I actually brought her over, she goes hey, I'm at your desk now and I'm the new clinical director and you are not, and I was like I just said that when I was like, oh okay, still no conversation from my actual boss.
Speaker 2:Wait. So they literally pulled the stuff out of your desk, like your personal possessions.
Speaker 1:Oh, like my pictures.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, like everything, Everything was like I don't think I truly realized that that meant that, like somebody else there, I thought they had just kind of like moved the desk itself. I don't know. You know what I was thinking, but like somebody literally went through all of your stuff.
Speaker 1:No, yeah, and like put it half some of in a box because the other desk out in the other area like didn't fit. So all of my stuff was just moved out there. And the crazy thing was is that the other girl was already moved into my desk, like she already had her shit up and stuff, and I was like when did that happen? I did a very good job not to get mad at my friend and that she's probably just being like cool, I got a promotion for no reason. Congrats, uh, congrats, I guess. But yeah, so stuff like that was happening and looking back it was just like. That was like so unprofessional, uncalled for, like there are so many words for that. But the biggest thing was the schedules shifting and the patients then were caught in the middle of that and that was super uncomfortable and weird and also financially problematic.
Speaker 2:Right. So at some point there I mean, like you had gotten, I thought you did an amazing job. Even now hearing it back, keeping your cool with all that stuff I think eventually you ended up writing me like you know what, like you can't have me still working here and treat me like this.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah. So I totally wrote like at this point I'm like this is actually I don't want to use the word discriminatory because I feel like that gets weird. But I was certainly not being treated like everyone else that worked there. That was like very uncalled for, and so I, you know, being the really wonderful employee that I was I was like this is not like right, like this is just, if you don't want me to be here, if, like, this can't happen. So I said in a very professional way via email and also requested a meeting, and I was like I'm getting treated very unfairly and we haven't even had a conversation about it yet.
Speaker 2:So something's got to get this is like a weekend and then the next day after that you come in and your boss's husband is there, right?
Speaker 1:And this is not like a me and Jesse situation, right? So like at Public Sanity, when we do performance reviews and stuff, like everyone knows that Jesse's an integral part of Public Sanity, there's like what is that called? That? We have Organization chart and stuff like that. Like he's on the org chart, okay, this person's husband comes in, and it was. I mean, every once in a while I would see him.
Speaker 2:At the Christmas party.
Speaker 1:Christmas party or just no, like he would be stopping by to like do something with their kids or whatever, and so like because I had known them for 10 years, like I knew him well but not like all of a sudden he's in this managerial capacity when he's literally never been in any other meeting ever at the clinic, and so I mean I knew something was up because everyone was acting super weird. But that is the person who did all of the talking during my fire.
Speaker 2:So even then it was just more staring from your boss.
Speaker 1:Yeah, did not say one word. Pretty much, in fact, this is where I could have done a lot better by just shutting my mouth at this point, knowing the writing was on the wall. But as this is happening and I'm like oh, I'm actually like I'm not coming here tomorrow, it was like I finally like kind of understood what was going on. I turned to my boss and I was like are you going to say anything? I'm like, I was like you need to look at me, and so I got a little confrontational like that. And then now there's three people in the room and he's trying to be like oh, you know, nicole, it's okay, calm down. I'm like no, listen, this is 10 years, 10 years and like this. So, you know, probably not my best moment overall, but certainly like frustrated disappointed with yourself if you hadn't said something.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean the whole thing was just like again. It was boiling to a point where I was like I cannot believe this is happening and you want to freaking? Look at me. So it's like what is going on after this longstanding relationship that we had? That was what was I mean at the at the end, right, my therapist says that you know, anger is a secondary emotion. So what really is that is that? It's sad. It's sad and very disappointing that such a good relationship and did the way that it it did, like this. But the story is not done yet, because this is where it gets even more nuts.
Speaker 2:Yeah, this is crazy. So you had already packed almost all of your stuff You're basically had already been, I mean, because your desk had been moved, so your stuff had already been in a box, but the thing left behind was your diploma up on the wall.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so at this clinic, like I'm sure many of you guys have, my old boss was gracious enough to take everybody's diploma and WS certificates and stuff and she got them professionally framed and she put them up on the wall.
Speaker 1:And it was kind of cool because at that point there was a bunch of people working there and it was like, oh neat, like this is all of your stuff. You felt for pretty proud and mine was up at the top because I was one of the first ones there. And so at the end of this weird fricking week and interaction and all the things, when I'm finally like okay, like I have all my stuff, I've already turned to my key, I've already, the computer is already there, all of the stuff, I was like well, the only thing left is my diploma on the wall still. So she goes over in a huff and like goes to get it down. And you know, the classy thing to do would have just been like, even though I paid for, like, even though I paid Michael's, probably with some 50% coupon the thing, just hand it to me, right. So she proceeds to flip it over on the desk and try to get out the diploma.
Speaker 2:And it's so that she can keep her empty frame.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:And so it's not the kind where you can just like get a knife and bring up those little tong things.
Speaker 2:It's a good thing. Nobody needed a knife in this situation.
Speaker 1:So you go back and it's just like paper on the back when you get something professionally framed like that. And so she like is getting very like agitated that this is what's going to happen. And so she's like give me some scissors. And so she so some I forget if it was the husband or if it was the front desk person that was still there gets her the scissors and she's like full on, like cutting into the back of the picture frame and like ripping back the paper, and then like shoves me my diploma.
Speaker 2:Hold on, because I know how scissors work, but you have to have like a starting point. So she like literally had to stab into the thing, into the thing to like yeah, it's just like murdering your diploma in this empty frame. For this like $17, michael frame.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it was very like not calm. This part I remember extremely vividly because I feel like it was going in slow motion, because I'm like this is really happening, Like we're really doing this. She's going to get scissors and she and cut it out. Okay, this is interesting. And I remember being like that's going to be hard with the way that it's the way that it's framed. And then it was like this tough thing. And so she's like literally cutting my diploma out of the picture frame and then shoves me my diploma. And then I was just like I actually don't exactly remember what I said because I was so like I don't know, I can't, couldn't believe what was happening. I think I just was like okay, bye, Bye. I hope I did like thumbs up or something.
Speaker 2:You had some kind of one liner, wasn't just by? I thought you said something like classy.
Speaker 1:Oh, maybe I said something like keep it classy huh. Or something like I said I must have said some smart ass comment because I was just like he's got to be kidding. Yeah, so that was that, and you would think that ends the story and it does not.
Speaker 2:So that's how pelvic sanity ended up getting started in five days it is possible. I don't know if anyone's done it faster than that. If you have, please write in and let us know. We've got a business kickstart program that will help the heck out of that.
Speaker 1:So fun fact, with this shout out to my wonderful, amazing friend from PT school, jake Caldwell, because pelvic sanity was not. It hadn't even been started yet in terms of like the build out that we were doing, and so I couldn't work anywhere. I was like what the hell am I going to do? And so I called up my friend Jake, and I was like, hey, he's got run a cash based practice ever since he graduated from PT school. He works 20 hours a week, right, so he had some time. And so I was like, hey, can I rent the other space from you? And he was like, yeah, so in five days we were seeing some patients.
Speaker 2:Yeah, some of our other options were doing it out of a garage. There was some other poor options, so we definitely owe Jake a big one with that. So, all of that being said, we want to just kind of bring some takeaways. Whether you're a business owner and are going to deal with this at some point in the future, if you're a clinician and you have given your resignation or are thinking about it or will at some point to make this as professional, as graceful as possible as we go through here, and I think the first thing to recognize and they called it for both the business owner and the employee this is an immediate change in their relationship.
Speaker 1:Yes. So this is the first like general takeaway for both parties involved is that and now that we've been through it, on the flip side at Pelvic Sanity there is an immediate and I'm talking like as soon as you realize that the meeting isn't just a hey, let me talk to you about something quick that it's an actual resignation meeting. Your relationship changes 100% from there on out. From an employee standpoint, that's giving their resignation. You're one foot out the door, you are looking ahead to your next venture and that's just what happens. And immediately the employer looks at I need to protect everything at my business and this is going to be a transition that I'm going to have to manage the shit out of, and we immediately go into selfish modes on both ends. That just is what happens. You can be the best person in the world, you can be the worst person in the world, and that is what the relationship changes like immediately.
Speaker 2:And that's even if you, as the employee, are trying to be great, trying to give your place time to do a transition plan. That's all great and it's all meant to help patients and all of the things. But Nicole is 100% right You've got one foot out the door from the moment you give your resignation. There's a couple of things that I think are going to be really helpful for those of you guys who are in the business owners arena. Let me just start with you guys.
Speaker 2:One of the things that one of our mentors told us that has made a huge impact on the way we think about things is this metaphor that your business is like a train and your employees are going to get on at the stop that makes sense for them and they're going to get off at a stop when it makes sense for them, and you don't get to control that. All you can do is make that train as great of an opportunity as it can possibly be for the people while they're on it. And if somebody takes it to the end of the line, then that is amazing. But not everybody is going to take the train to the end of the line. In fact, most people don't. And just recognizing that and realizing I think we have this unrealistic expectation and a public sanity was kind of reinforced because we didn't have any turnover in the first three or four years of the business. It was amazing.
Speaker 1:Hey, we were almost five.
Speaker 2:We hired all of these great people and they're going to be with us forever, just like you, nicole, we're thinking you would be with your past employer forever. It doesn't work that way. So we have to anticipate and logically, we know it, but we don't ever think it's going to happen to us or to happen to that person and just recognizing that it may not be a forever situation for all of your people, you will, if you're in business long enough, have people leave and now you get to choose and this is what we're going to be talking about in this episode how that happens and how professional you maintain it and how you want the person to feel. And that's why we talked about this whole backstory is the reason that we think so deeply about this is because we never want anyone to be made to feel the way that Nicole was as she was leaving. We're acutely conscious that this is an emotional time for both parties and we have to maintain professionalism, we have to maintain kindness, we have to maintain boundaries all of those things in these difficult times.
Speaker 1:I will also say, too, your business will be okay. And if you find yourself in the position, an emotional position, where you're super stressed out about somebody leaving, then that's like a little bit of a red slash, yellow flag, that in a little bit of a wake up call, that like, ooh, maybe your business isn't as solid foundationally as it can be, as it has the potential to be.
Speaker 2:This is why when you're once hiring, you're always hiring. You guys in our business mentorship programs have heard that like if you've got employees, you are always hiring, but that is the first thing to take away as a business owner. Your business will be okay.
Speaker 1:It will be okay.
Speaker 2:The place that Nicole left. She was integrally involved. She was putting out fires on the daily. I can't imagine somebody actually more integral to a business is running than you were at that place and that place is fine.
Speaker 1:Totally. Yeah, we'll get into what the clinician thing but we'll skip ahead just a bit. You're really not as important as you think you are, so it's okay, but from a business owner standpoint, your business will be okay. Second thing be professional. Period, that is a complete sentence. Just be professional. It's not that hard. It's a fucking low bar. It's a pretty damn low bar.
Speaker 2:But I will say this is a little bit difficult, nicole, because it should, I think, sting a bit when somebody leaves. And you know people leave for all different reasons and some hurt more than others. But if you're the type of employer who really cares, who puts a lot of thought into creating a great environment, who works at the company culture, who genuinely cares about the career of your people and you want them to be happy, it does sting when somebody leaves Totally. You're like I created this amazing place. Why don't you want to stay here? What's going on?
Speaker 1:Yeah, like what in the world? But this is where your leadership should trump any feelings that you have. Like you, your leadership here and how you make somebody feel, even in a challenging time, is really what you're all about. What they're going to remember the most is the time after they give the resignation, not anything that happened before. So be professional. It may sting, it probably will sting, it should sting, if you care, but leadership should be at the forefront of all the decision making things after that time.
Speaker 2:And the third thing here is just make a clear plan. So you almost heard Nicole make a plan for her boss, but what is the clinician who's leading? What are they supposed to say? Who are they supposed to tell? And the answer should be like you should be the one handling most of the communication, by the way. How is the front desk going to communicate this to patients so that somebody doesn't wander in and you have switched the person that they're seeing without telling them, and the person that they were supposed to be seeing is literally sitting in an office staring at them.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:Right. You don't want that kind of situation. So you need to make a clear plan as the leader, as the business owner. That might be a different end date than what your employee gave you. You might move somebody's date of resignation up. You probably don't want to do it the way that Nicole's former boss did, but you have control of that. You were not obligated to allow them to serve out the amount of time there. That's going to depend on how much time they gave. What your transition plan is what you feel like is best for the business. Frankly, on your relationship with that clinician and your trust in them because it is a trust process- yeah, where they're going, it matters a ton.
Speaker 1:It matters a ton of things.
Speaker 1:We've done it both ways.
Speaker 1:We've let people go all the way to their end date that they gave and we've also moved up people's end date, you know, and the end date is something where the script of how we communicate to staff and how we communicate to patients sometimes those are on different timelines, sometimes the staff knows but we don't tell patients yet.
Speaker 1:Sometimes everybody knows around the same time but there's still a hierarchy of communication at the clinic that it's crunch time now and everybody needs to be over communicated with and there needs to be a very clear I'm going to say it again leader in this whole thing. This is objectively a relatively emotional time and it's a time of flux and anytime there is a change or a time of flux we need to have over communication as leaders to make sure everybody that is staying behind feels really secure and good and still has a really great place to work in. I am sure that behind closed doors of other employees that were working at the place where I was working during that weird week that was to been, I mean, you could cut the tension in that place with a freaking knife, and that is not fun.
Speaker 2:Well, every single clinician who was working with you at that time left within six or nine months.
Speaker 1:Yeah, less than a year.
Speaker 2:Which makes a ton of sense when you can see how right it's almost like we're talking a lot about the bachelor recently, right. But then you see the way that somebody interacts with somebody else and even if it's not done to you, you're like, oh, that's shown a light on that person's character.
Speaker 1:Totally. You can say a lot by how people treat each other, and so you need to make sure that, as the employee, as the owner of the business, that you are doing everything on the up and up and being professional and just making that clear plan of being an actual leader, as you should.
Speaker 2:And number two and three come easier when you realize your business will be okay. It is going to be a step back, you're going to miss the person, but your business will be okay. Then you need to be professional and then make a clear plan. Now, on the other end of the spectrum, if you are the clinician who is leaving, we've got some thoughts and rules for you. Hopefully, if you're leaving because of something you didn't like at your current practice, you've given your employer a chance to rectify it. That always, I think, was one of the things Nicole that kind of, I think, always felt good about when you had left, as you had, probably to a fault, given a lot of opportunities to rectify issues and made it a very clear decision to leave. But assuming you've made the decision, a month is a generous amount of time.
Speaker 1:Yes, let's just go back real quick, though, to talk about the conversation. If you're leaving because something's not great or something is, there's something bothering you at the place and no place is perfect, but there can't be things like where you're just like you know what. This is enough for me. I'm not going to do this anymore, but I want you to think about how you've communicated to your employer. Is it? You think that you may have said something, but that could have just been complaining? Essentially, I want you to have this had a meeting, said hey, this current situation is like, not sustainable. I'm not happy, and here are the things that I am not happy about, and I want to make this work. Can we come to some sort of an agreement? That's the kind of professionalism that I think, from an employee standpoint, and communication you need to have If you're leaving because there's something that's not going great.
Speaker 2:Absolutely so. If you've already made that decision, then you know. A lot of times Nicole did the more than a month of time because she already told you a little bit about this, but because you feel like you are so important, so integral. What are your patients going to do without you? What's going to be the transition? Oh no, this place is going to fall apart without me. I need to be around until all of my patients are discharged. All of those different things can sometimes lead to kind of weirdly long amounts of time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's very interesting we hear. And then we've in our business mentorship capacity. We've heard just so many stories about this and honestly, you guys I'm going to break it down for you as an employee a month is fine. We're in a professional environment that patients do. They are the third party in this situation. So I think two weeks, I think it could be fine, but it's certainly not signaling If you just give two weeks, it's not signaling that you have thought about it and that you're trying to do right by your employer, anything more than a month.
Speaker 1:Honestly, because of the thing that we've said, with like everybody's relationship changes, it's just too long. It's just too long and we've had people go for more time and it's actually turned out fine, but it's just like everyone kind of gets antsy at the end and it's just like this went on for too long. So a month is like that sweet spot and just know, like my dad so wisdom, so full of wisdom told me that you do need to expect it to be your last day when you give your resignation, and that's well within the rights of the employer to do so. Make sure you have your ducks in a row and do the months and then see what happens from there.
Speaker 2:So, absolutely, that's to the first piece. Second piece is this is a little bit of a difficult one. It's kind of like with a breakup where your tendency is to kind of villainize the person and think about all the negative stuff and all the reasons you're leaving, and it's really just kind of resolving that cognitive dissonance of I am leaving this place. Therefore, I need to almost convince myself that it was the right decision and it's really difficult to you know you sense the need to do this, but try not to villainize your current place, your experience, your boss unnecessarily. Now, if your boss is a dick, your boss is a dick, like that is the fact of the matter in that case.
Speaker 2:But there are good and bad things about every place you're going to work. The grass is not always greener on the other side and just be able to try to take your boss's lead through that. This is not the time to honestly unless something's like really just being done wrong or unethically or hurting patients in a profound way just take your boss's lead through this time. This is not the time to have like a ton of opinions on how your leaving should happen, like you've made your decision. Your decision was to leave and give this amount of notice. Now you're kind of like at your boss's whim a little bit on how this is going to play out on what they want you to say to patients when they want to tell staff, when they want to tell your patient population how they want to handle it. Do they want to give you a party? Like, please don't go to your boss and tell them that you want, like, chocolate cake for your going away party.
Speaker 1:Yeah, don't do that. But yeah, you don't get it both ways. You don't get to be the one to do the breaking up and then have an opinion on how someone else is handling it. Like you're literally going to leave, like what do you care?
Speaker 1:Honestly, and I think that we get a lot it's in our own way with this as practitioners, because we put too much emphasis on what's going to happen to patients and it does suck in a service based industry like this, where patients, especially in public health, they get. They get attached to us. It is an intimate thing that we're doing with them. So I can see that there's a different level of attachment, but there is no such thing as a public health emergency. All of your patients will be fine. Like it isn't your responsibility other than to do an excellent job and to continue doing an excellent job throughout the entire time that you were an actual employee of that place. That's it. You don't get to have any opinions anymore because you're the one who said you're going to leave. Your allegiance is not with your current boss. Your allegiance should be with your future place. That's it.
Speaker 2:So just serve out your time. Don't rock the boat and understand that even if there's a decision that you don't 100% agree with, unless it's egregious, just go with the flow as you're heading out. And then I think that last one, Nicole, is what you hit on there. They aren't really your patients. I know you're the one who treats them, but they're not yours.
Speaker 1:I know this. Actually this was really hard for me as an employee to sort of grasp, but now that I'm on the other side, I hope that this can help you have some peace and leave more gracefully at your current job. Because they aren't your patients and for the majority of people listening to this podcast, you didn't have to market and get your own patients. You showed up, you provided excellent patient care and you had nothing to do with the conversion on the phone, with the marketing, with the doing anything else, and even if you did, hopefully you got paid for it or it was completely volunteer or whatever, Like. There's a time when you take on your caseload as if it's your own, because it is, and you take a lot of responsibility for the patients on your caseload, but the fact that you have that caseload, the acquisition of that patient, is not your, was not your responsibility when you're working and it's not your responsibility when you're leaving, and so that is one of the things that I want you to take away is that they aren't your patients, and when you realize that, then again your job just goes back to I'm going to provide the best patient care that's in the best interest of the patient for the time that I'm here, and that includes remaining completely clinically honest about what they need to be doing.
Speaker 1:Just because you're leaving doesn't mean that your plan of care for them changes. So if they were coming once a week and they're in the middle of their plan of care and you're leaving in two weeks and they still need to be seen, your job is not to give them a home program and discharge them and close out your caseload, unless your boss wants you to do that. And, quite frankly, then your question needs to be what are what's going to happen to these patients? And and is there a? Is there a transition plan within my company? Is there a transition plan? You know, if you're the only provider there, that's, it becomes interesting because you do need to know. Where are we going to tell these people, Because in order to be clinically honest, then we need to. Where are we going to tell them to go? That's a valid question. But if your boss says I don't know, I don't care, then you can say I recommend that you come once a week and you're not done Now you need to go. Do your own research on where you're going to go.
Speaker 2:Find out. Yes, and then here's another thing with that, with them not being your patients, right, they were obtained by the clinic, they came through the clinic's processes, they went to the clinic's website. Don't solicit your patients to come with you. If you're doing to another practice, if you're starting your own thing, don't do it. It's not worth it to do. And just to be completely clear, two things here. One, if you're starting a practice because you're anticipating that people are going to go with you, that's a really dumb reason to start a practice.
Speaker 1:Yes, if you are counting people and being like, looking at your current caseload and being like, ooh, that person that will come and that person totally will and that person loves me for sure, I would need you to erase that right now and in big red, ink, right Zero. You need to build your business as if nobody's going to follow you.
Speaker 2:Absolutely. And then the other piece about this is that we now have a wonderful tool called Google, so people are able to find you. So if you need to say something or if a patient is specifically asking you, the really classy thing to do, the way that we instruct people if they're leaving public sanity is, you know, out of respect to the place I'm working. I can't really talk about that, but you're absolutely welcome to Google me. Google is your friend when you leave here, right?
Speaker 2:People will find you if they need to, but you do not need to put yourself in the position of soliciting clients. That is the easiest way to have a problem legally. That's the easiest way to have a problem relationally with your place. It's just not going to be worth it for you to do to keep a couple of people or to to make that thing happen. So that's our rules for you guys. For clinicians, that a month is a generous amount of time. Don't villainize your boss and experience. Try to take your boss's lead as you're going through that and remember that they're not your patients. And so to get to the end of the story here, I mean it's. It is nice that the story that Cole has such a happy ending that you and your boss got together almost five, six, seven years later. You guys hugged it out. You had. You know we're actually going to be collaborating on.
Speaker 1:Totally kidding, I did not have none of that stuff happened.
Speaker 2:It got really icky. Lawyers got involved to the point where we actually it was kind of great that we kept so many records and receipts we ended up sending something back that just shut all of the accusations and problems and all that stuff just got shut down completely because we had like irrefutable evidence that what it was saying wasn't true. That we sent back. So that stopped all the legal stuff. Unfortunately, that did not stop your old boss from continuing to repeat those lies. I'll hit it again.
Speaker 1:To this day.
Speaker 2:To this day, eight years later, to the point where we've got like a semi prominent person from at least Southern California standards is writing you and saying I heard what you did and karma's a bitch. Yeah, I was like hey, not great, but I do think this is one of the reasons why it is so important as an employee, to be so upstanding in the way, like to go out of your way, to be outstanding and how you leave a place, because that would have been really scary or really hurtful If there had been even like a modicum of truth in it. If there had been even a little bit, it would have been way more difficult to deal with. It was still like a little bit. You know you're just trying to start a business.
Speaker 2:You can imagine you're getting threatening letters, you're getting all of this stuff. Plus it's again the dissolving of a, you know, 10 year friendship relationship, mentorship relationship. But the fact that you knew for a fact that you had done everything completely right, even in the face of all of this bullshit, yeah, was really the only thing that I think kept us sane is like realizing, because if there had been even like a hint of truth in any of her stuff, it would have been really hard to deal with. That was the ceiling, so that's why we always really recommend, when somebody's leaving to do their own thing, make sure that you're doing it in the classiest, most upstanding way, because you don't get to control how the situation ends up. All you can do is control what you are doing, how you're behaving, how are you behaving with integrity, and then let the cards fall where they may.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but, you don't get to control that outcome.
Speaker 1:And the other advice that I have and I know that this is so difficult when you're in it, but if we can take a play out of the referees book and just be like try, try, try to stay as even keeled as possible, because it is an emotional time and for everybody involved. And, like Jesse said, you just can't. You can only control your own actions and so you can't control what what's going to go on around you. You can't control what patients are going to do. You know, I had patients that were freaking out, blowing up my Instagram. Where do you what happened? Oh my God, they're not telling me where you are and all the things, and like that's well within their right to not say where I was going. But again they found me right. So it's like Google the gram, your friend, at that point too. Yeah, just try to keep everything emotionally that could otherwise be emotionally charged without as much emotion as possible.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I hope that helps you guys, whatever side of this that you're on in your career, whether you are the business owner or the clinical director who might be dealing with this, or if you're a clinician who is going to be giving your notice, I think, going back to that fundamental realization that people are going to leave for reasons that maybe you, as the employer, think are good, for reasons that you're not so sure about, whatever it is, there's going to be turnover at your practice. Unfortunately, people won't stay forever and they probably shouldn't, and there's growth to be had with that and we're not going to be the right fit for everybody at every stage of their life, and the earlier that we can realize that, I do think, nicole, that takes some of the emotion out of it. Just to get through the whole thing, just be professional and present yourself in a way that you're going to look back on and be proud of the way that you handled the situation.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you know, on that note, I will say this the challenge to any of you if you've left a job and it's been really great and smooth and awesome and you just sort of left and you had your party or your whatever and you just sort of left, you know what, I would highly recommend that you somehow reach out LinkedIn, instagram, something, reach out to that former employer and be like hey, you know what, I really appreciated our relationship, I am so glad we're still in contact, or whatever. I just do a little shout out. I actually, after this experience, after leaving, I actually contacted my old boss at the hospital program who was super professional, very gracious when I gave my notice there and I was objectively like running their whole program and everything like that. Now, in hindsight, I'm like she probably had a resignation every other day. But I said to her I was like thank you so much for being so awesome.
Speaker 1:I didn't realize what an amazing transition that was until I had one that wasn't so awesome. So, you know, just pay it forward a little bit with some positivity. I hope that's. One of the reasons why we wanted to do this podcast is to make the transition better for everybody that's going through it to add grace into everybody's life. With that in mind, and pay it forward with a little positivity.
Speaker 2:Absolutely so. If you guys have any stories about leaving places, we would love to hear them. Please send an email to us. If you can top Nicole's story, I will be so giddy to just hear those, so feel free to shoot those in. That's Nicole at PelvicSanitycom. Would love to hear them. Of course, we will keep them anonymous, but we will get a good laugh out of them ourselves and, as always, guys, we hope this is helpful, whatever side of the street you're on at this point. But yeah, just making this I like how you said it, nicole just a little bit more grace in a difficult situation for everyone involved. So we hope this has been helpful for you. Guys. We would love to hear from you. Please reach out. As always, we want to keep this conversation going and let's continue to rise.