Welcome to TCN Talks. The goal of our podcast is to provide concise and relevant information for busy hospice and palliative care leaders and staff. We understand your busy schedules and believe that brevity signals respect. And now here's our host, Chris Comeaux.
Chris Comeaux:Hello and welcome to TCN Talks. This is a fun show. It's kind of become an annual tradition at the end of the year. Before I jump in, I just want to wish you and your families just all of our listeners out there hope you've had a blast holiday season, hope you've had a merry Christmas and looking forward to a great 2024 being with you. This is always a fun show because what we do is we actually do kind of a year in view.
Chris Comeaux:Look back on some of the top podcasts that we've had this past year. Just in case you missed any of them, just give you a quick thumbnail so you can go back and find those podcasts and whatever platform that you listen to us. And then also, we're always in with a really good piece of wisdom. We've got great feedback on it, which is the one word we're going to talk about that in just a couple of moments. We do want to thank you, our listeners. We've had a very successful podcast this year. We had a goal we want to reach 5,000 people this year, get to 5,000 listeners, and we've done that. Just want to keep encouraging you and thank you first off for listening. We do this to be an aid to you to get a short bolus of information. We try to keep them anywhere from about 25, no more than about 45 minutes. We shoot for that 30 minute range so that way you can listen to it on your drive time. But short, pithy, to the point and important information that will help you the leader, staff member and hospice and powder care organizations. But also we found this year one of the highest growing areas is that a lot of hospice leaders have paid it forward to their board members. We've gotten a lot of feedback that has been a great aid to them. So thank you to our listeners. Keep paying this forward Every person in your organization. Hopefully you're paying it forward to. If you've got any feedback for new shows you want us to do next year, we're always willing and able to listen to any feedback that you have for us. All right, so let's actually jump in and kind of do our year in review. And so, beginning of the year, we started off with a great show. It was actually with Sheila Burke. She's a senior public policy advisor at Baker Donaldson Bearman, called Wilhelm Berkowitz, and a research faculty member at Junk Lecturer at Harvard University. Title of it was Is it a Staffing Challenger or a Staffing Crisis? Well no, the staffing challenge is a big deal. There are so many great pearls in that podcast.
Chris Comeaux:Next one that I want to kind of point out a look back in order to look forward, really forward. This is with Peter Benjamin. Peter is one of the most provocative and I say provocative in a good way, because he pushes you to think where things are going in the future Talked about, and Peter has such a great history in hospice and powder of care, and so he had a lot of great points. We talked about Medicare Advantage. Peter is consulting for a lot of what I'll call very visionary organizations, and Peter cited the S-curve theory. If you know about that in business school, it's like the bell shaped curve. It's what we see in hospice and powder of care for people's lives and how organizations need to realize where you're at on that curve, because that brings a lot of necessity for change. So that was a great listen.
Chris Comeaux:One after that I want to point out was with Katie Lanz, reading the tea leaves and practical advice for the future. Katie is one of the most sought after consultants in the country. Our organization is called Top Sight Partners. The great thing about Katie is she grew up in hospice and powder of care as a hospice nurse and a powder of care provider and ended up actually working with a spire. So she's had great experience and now she's doing some fascinating consulting projects. The fact one that we talked about was with Dollar General, and the reason why Is that all Americans live within about five miles. Well, the vast majority of Americans, I should say, live within about five miles of a dollar general and they had a lot of interesting reasons why they wanted to look at healthcare. So check out that podcast. If you never listened to it, then one is always amazing.
Chris Comeaux:For me is I had time with Quint Studer. That's actually the title of the actual podcast. Quint's one of my favorite mentors in my life, still pouring into leaders. He just started a new company called Healthcare Plus Solutions Group and we just talked about some, lots of things. I probably have quoted this podcast probably more than any other, because one of the things that Quint said in that podcast he said mental and emotional health and tools. So for yourself, but also as a leader, it has no longer soft skills. That is, now essential skills going forward, and I love that framing. Again, I've probably quoted that gosh, I don't know how many times 25 times this year and then there was kind of a monologue podcast with me called Grow so Flow, no and R&D, and in that podcast I tried to encapsulate what I'm learning from all these amazing gas, lots of different work that we do with Intelios, in other words, what is coming and then give a little bit of a prescription at the end. That's kind of encapsulated pretty pithily Grow so Flow, no and R&D. And you should go back and listen to that podcast if you don't know what that means.
Chris Comeaux:Then after that we actually had a podcast with Carla Davis and the title was the Value of Hospice Today and Into the Future, and Carla is a senior vice president, lhc group. Probably the most touching part I mean. First off, carla oversees what is now the largest hospice in the entire country, as now Optum LHC group is under Optum and then the Metasys is about ready to be as well. So you think about her scope of leadership. But probably the most poignant part was actually a personal experience with her. Dad Actually moved me to tears, moved her to tears, and so that was an awesome show. We got a lot of feedback on that one.
Chris Comeaux:Then, after that one actually was by request from a listener said you guys should do a podcast on ICF. Well, there's only one great resource out there, which is Dr Harry Feliciano, prior chief medical officer of Palmetto. And we brought Rondo's because they partnered on ICF and it's a framework because we've all had challenges of how do we know this patient truly is appropriate and still appropriate for hospice, and Dr Feliciano is one of the foremost experts on the concept of ICF, the international class of function. That was a great, that was a deep one. Do a lot of reading and research before that one. Then after that we had Miriam Grant and so Miriam's title of that podcast was Rethinking and Redesigning the Future of Hospice and Powder Care. If you don't know Miriam, she actually worked for CoverGirl Marketing. I love her because she brings great business world top notch marketing experience and she actually became a nurse and then later a powder care practitioner and now she's kind of porting all of that experience together. So that was a great podcast, a lot of great pearls.
Chris Comeaux:And then we had a good In fact, I got an email not too long ago and said here are the top 50 speakers in the country: Tony Robbins, and there was my good friend Meridith Elliott-Powell., Meridith Elliott-Powell. In fact we got probably as much feedback on this show than any other called how to Thrive no Matter what the Future Brings. Meridith is incredible. That was a great podcast and it's just so much wisdom. Meridith and I were just bouncing off of each other and I actually listened to it a couple of times myself and got some pearls from it just re-listening to it. So that was a great podcast.
Chris Comeaux:And then Another good friend, Julie Kennedy Oehlert. What's Love Got to Do With it? And Julie's amazing. She has a book coming out, her first book, I think an early part of 2024. And we just talked about what's Love Got to Do With it. And there's this great culture, a pearls of wisdom, kind of an inspiration for the work that we do. Again, Julie's just filled with wisdom. So I really enjoyed doing that show, got a lot of great feedback on that one as well.
Chris Comeaux:Then a very thought-provoking show, dr Joan Tino, who's one of the foremost researchers in the hospice and powder care space, who's a little bit towards the tail end. Hopefully she'll still be working many, many more years, but not quite as much as she's had in the past. She's a leading adjunct professor at Brown University and we talked a lot about measuring what matters. How do you define quality in this space and how do we need to keep redefining quality? And what about as we go into the Medicare Advantage realm? And the next show after that was one I've been wanting to do and we'll probably have a couple more.
Chris Comeaux:In fact, listeners, if you've got some great ideas, this is the future of Alzheimer's and dementia care, and we had a couple of great young Dr. Stelley Gutman and Elizabeth Lackey, who are actually part of a very innovative model near Asheville, north Carolina, called Memory Care, and so we were talking about the future of Alzheimer's and dementia care and that actually provoked a lot of interesting responses that I got from other people saying hey, Chris, did you know that we're doing this innovative thing? So that's another subject I want to hit in 2024. We know that Alzheimer's dementia population is just a different population. One of the phrases that Dr Tino said that just was like a brain tattoo. She says the decline for Alzheimer's and dementia patients is a decline by inches and that's what makes it so difficult to fit it into just our more traditional hospice model of care. So I love that show. Again, that's probably one, and again, if you guys have like, hey, you should think about this person for a show in 2024, reach out to us.
Chris Comeaux:And then we had a show with my good friend Carole Fisher and Bill Keane, and so they just finished a project. A research project with Bill Keen works with emergence, and so the title of the show was People Over Profits, and there is some amazing nuggets. They came out of this joint venture project that emergence did with MPHI, the National Partnership for Healthcare and Hospice Innovation. I know the title is a little provocative People Over Profits, especially those who have grown up in the nonprofit realm, is like well duh, no kidding. But they did a lot of research. Like, if we think about it, I have about 28 years now in hospice and powder care. The greatest generation has been who have been caring for and, as we're speaking, that is shifting to a different demographic, which is the baby boomers. So to have timely research of what do they really value, what do they expect of us? There was just some great pearls in that podcast and then we've got a show that will right before this one that we've got Bob Tavari's is going to be talking about.
Chris Comeaux:CMS says that 100% of all healthcare will be in ACOs by 2030. What does that mean and where Bob is with health pivots and what he sees within the data. That's one of our last shows of the year, now one of the ones I've skipped over that we've done each month. But I just want to call out Mark Cohen has been a great thought partner this year. This was an idea I actually got over at Christmas Break last year. That wouldn't it be a great service if we had a show each month to say these were the top news stories of this past month? Like a short pithy Now usually those are about 35 minutes or so, but these are the top news stories and Mark produces hospice news today. So he's been producing. This is what I see from a quantitative standpoint, and then my role in that show is as a C-suite leader or a leader in hospice and powder care. These are the ones I hope that you did not miss and we're going to continue those into 2024. You probably have heard by now that Mark is going to be retiring from producing hospice news today. He's got a great succession plan with Quirk Kassner. We're going to talk about that more into 2024. So that service is going to continue to go forward, and so, and then Mark and I were going to continue to do that show because we've gotten a lot of good feedback One is a great service and we've also got some great feedback on how to make that show even more entertaining, which will keep tweaking that going into 2024.
Chris Comeaux:And Mark and I did that, of course, every month of this past year, so that's a year in review. Believe it or not, we did 30 podcasts. I know that sounds like a lot and you're thinking, well, crap, I missed a bunch and I don't have time to catch up. Remember, they're about 30 minutes or so and we do that on purpose, for drive time or workout, all right. So the next thing that I wanted to talk to you about is really become a tradition, which is this concept of the one word. Now, at Teleios, we teach that having a role description, maybe even having your personal mission statement, are good things and of course, we've done, I think, the One Word podcast in 2022, 2021. And I think in 2020 we did it as a blog. He may go okay, ben there got the T-shirt, but I wanted to talk about it a little bit differently this year and I want to back up and actually share some wisdom Well before, because there actually is a book. There's a great YouTube about the concept of one word.
Chris Comeaux:One of the very first leadership books that made a great impact on my life was Stephen Covey's Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.
Chris Comeaux:Now there may have been someone before him, but his first person ever heard talk about writing a personal mission statement.
Chris Comeaux:I don't know if you've ever done that.
Chris Comeaux:I've actually found this very powerful thing in my life, and here's the interesting thing is I kind of basically look through the rear view mirror of my life and then start to kind of shift to look out of the windshield. What I've done each year round Christmas time try to have about a day where I'm exactly doing that, looking through the rear view mirror and then start to position in the upcoming year and I relook at my mission statement. Now I can look back through the rear view mirror now and I can see that I used to have about a paragraph or so, but in the last couple of years it's gotten very short and concise. For me, my mission statement comes down to how can I help and I think I've gotten that great clarity by that reflective practice, once a year, just pulling it back up, thinking about what I've done this past year and then think about what it'd like to do in the coming year. So fine, that's a great time to one have a mission statement and then, on an annual basis, review your mission statement.
Jeff Haffner:Thank you to our TCN Talks sponsored DeltaCareRX. Deltacarerx is also the title sponsor for our May and November 2023 leadership immersion courses. Deltacarerx is primarily known as a national hospice, pbm and prescription mail order company. Deltacarerx is a premier vendor of TCN and provides not only pharmaceutical care, but also niche software innovations that save their customers time, stress and money. Thank you, deltacarerx, for all the great work you do in end of life and serious illness care.
Chris Comeaux:Because the one word is gonna come out of that. Next thing is that one thing that we teach at Teleast is the concept of a role description. Now, years ago, stephen Covey, if you remember, in the seven habits, one of the things he would say is you are the computer programmer of your life, so write the script and then live it. It was kind of a metaphor for the first three habits. Well, the concept of a role description is very similar and so, for instance, I have several roles in life. I'm a husband, I'm a dad, a father, and I'm the CEO of Teleast, and I have several community and other board roles and things like that. So I have different roles that I have to play. Now my mission is kind of embedded in who I am, but at this moment there's a certain way I need to tap into that mission and then tap into other skills and talents and emerging skills and talents and play a role at this moment. So that's the concept of a role description. It's a very powerful thing. We teach it a lot at Teleast, we teach it in our leadership immersion course. So you go, okay, well, what's a one word? And what I found is having those other tools in my life. The one word becomes a thematic prophecy, a guiding principle, a guiding light to the upcoming year and, the really cool thing, I've done one word now for I think, probably seven, probably seven, eight years. Okay, I should go back and see my one word each year and what I thought that word meant, going into the year and then using it as a theme throughout the year. At the end of the year it means something deeper to me and through that deepness and that understanding, my personal mission statement and my personal role description have a lot more weight to them. I have better clarity in those things by utilizing the one word. So, just to be very succinct, the one word just feels like a theme for the upcoming year and so many people prayerfully consider it.
Chris Comeaux:At Teleios we recently we did something called a menti, which is like a real time poll, and it was so great to see our organization and our team that this was my one word the past year. Many of our team members weekly we say these are our priorities for the week. We call that our big rocks. At the bottom of their signature they actually have their one word for the year. There's a hospital in Western North Carolina that on the name tags of their staff. They encourage all their staff to do the one word. They actually have their one word in their name tag and recently I went and got some healthcare from that entity and asked the lady about her one word.
Chris Comeaux:And it was such a rich and robust conversation, so prayerfully meditating, just getting quiet and just asking what is your one word, I find usually in about the last month of the year I started to get a sense of what that one word is. Sometimes I'll prayerfully even try to ask for confirmation. The coolest thing is several years ago my one word that I was getting a sense of was solitude, and anybody who knows me is probably laughing at the fact that I had that as a one word. And I was actually. We were driving to Louisiana for my parents for the holiday and I was like I'm really going to need some confirmation. This is my one word and I kid you not, I actually have a picture of this. I looked up and on the back of a camper as big as you please was the word solitude and I ended up pulling my phone out. My wife was fussing at me. She's like don't be pulling your cell phone out while you're driving. I'm like I got to get a picture of that RV right in front of us, because that's the confirmation that that was supposed to be my one word for the year. And again, the funny thing is that year, what I thought that word meant, and almost maybe some hesitation, like I'm not sure I want this to be my one word had a much deeper meaning by the end of the year. So strongly encourage you if you would like to actually share with us. Hey, this is what my one word is going to be for 2024. We'd love for you to share that with us.
Chris Comeaux:So, as we conclude this show, again, happy holidays, looking forward to a great 2024 together. We have a great thing to announce we're actually going to be launching a new podcast. I hope that you've heard that I have my first book that's come out, called the Anatomy of Leadership. It's available on Amazon. So we have a new podcast in 2024 called the Anatomy of Leadership, and so we're still going to have TCN talks, which is usually about twice a month, thank you, and then slotting in the other two months is gonna be the anatomy of leadership. We're gonna have some great guests.
Chris Comeaux:The reason why I wrote that book was basically to be a meta framework to help you find your cause and purpose and live your cause and purpose. So we're gonna bring guests, we're gonna do a few monologues just to keep pouring into you so you could better find your cause and purpose and better live your cause and purpose as a leader. So continue to subscribe to TCN. Hopefully you'll be subscribing to the anatomy of leadership. We're gonna have it both on YouTube.
Chris Comeaux:Make sure you hit that bell and that way I'll notify you every time we have a new podcast, when it drops, so you don't miss an episode, because we really have an incredible lineup of guests already for TCN Talks and an incredible lineup of guests for our new podcast, the Anatomy of Leadership. So happy holidays to you and your family. And, as I always do, I wanna close with a quote, this one from Dolly Parton. My family and I were just recently in Pigeon Forge in Gatlinburg Always a great time to think about Dolly. I love this quote. One of our team members brought it to me Find out who you are and do it on purpose. Thanks for listening to TCN Talks.