149 Coaching Client Spotlight: Lori-Ann Edwards, M.B.B.S.

In this episode, Kemi is joined by Dr. Lori-Ann Edwards, a pediatric anesthesiologist at Johns Hopkins Hospital. As a pediatric anesthesiologist, Dr. Edwards is dedicated to providing perioperative care for pediatric patients undergoing anesthesia. Her keen interest lies in enhancing the quality and safety of anesthesia delivery within this patient population. Leveraging her experience in quality and performance improvement research, she is committed to designing initiatives aimed at establishing sustainable, high-quality, and cost-effective perioperative care. Dr. Lori-Ann Edwards is also an alumnus of our Get That Grant® coaching program!

The episode unfolds with a deep dive into the challenges and mindset shifts required for lasting change. Join the conversation as Dr. Edwards unveils the profound impact of coaching, from cultivating confidence to mastering the art of prioritization and unlocking her "unicorn time” and

• The profound impact of coaching on her professional trajectory, unraveling the layers of personal growth and empowerment.
• The strategies and insights gained through coaching that enabled her to navigate the complexities of her demanding profession.
• The broader implications of coaching, emphasizing the untapped potential within every individual and the transformative influence it can have on personal and professional spheres.

Loved this convo? Please go find Dr. Edwards on Twitter/X @LoriEd2022 and show her some love!

And if you'd like to learn more foundational career navigation concepts for women of color in academic medicine and public health, sign up for our KD Coaching Foundations Series: www.kemidoll.com/foundations.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

I think part of the power of what you just described of getting into the community and feeling the resonance immediately and being like, wait a minute, is that we have had too many experiences where we're supposed to be similar on superficial level. So people are like, oh, you know, we're doing a diversity thing, come through, blah, blah, blah, or women in anesthesia or the first year fellows, all those things. Like we have all experienced this. where it's like, oh no, we're gonna gather all these quote unquote like-minded folks, right? Based on these very superficial parameters. And you get in and of course you're like, don't belong here because of X, because of Y, right? There are all these reasons why it's like, this does not apply to me, whatever. So you do not have a sense of belonging. I think the hesitation, which I totally understand is people are like, no, I've done this before. Like, I don't wanna be the person teaching people or I don't wanna be the person who's still the odd one out or all those things. But the difference is, and I think what you're describing the consequence of is that we don't match on superficial. Like you said, you opened a Word document to fill out your application. Part of the things that we are screening for is that resonance. Does this community fit with you and what you're trying to do and what we do here and how you think about your work and the place of it and the purpose of what you're trying to do? Hello, hello Hello, you are listening to your unapologetic career. Being a woman of color faculty in academic medicine who wants to make a real difference with your career can be tough. Listen, these systems are not built for us, but that doesn't mean we can't make them work for us. In each episode, I'll be taking a deep dive into one core growth strategy so you can gain confidence and effectiveness in pursuing the dream career you worked so hard to achieve. All you have to do is tune in to your unapologetic career with me, your host, Kemi Dole, physician, surgeon, researcher, coach, and career strategist for an always authentic, sometimes a little raw, but unapologetically empowering word. I keep it real for you because I want you to win. Okay. I don't know about you, but for me, whenever I'm trying to learn something new or integrate something new in my life, I really need to see it written down. I need a framework to understand how to make it come alive for me and also so I can adapt it to make it work for me. And that's what I was thinking about when I started writing the KD Coach Foundation newsletters way back in 2019. really clearly and honestly briefly about some career shifting tactics, strategies, and perspectives that can truly change people's experience of their career. Now, let's be honest. Some of these were great. Some of them were good. And some of them were just a really good try. But what I've done is compiled them into a digestible format of all of the great ones. I want to be able to keep this knowledge going. I got so many messages over and over again about how how much the newsletters were changing people's approach to their productivity, the approach to managing their sanity and their energy during the week, and their approach to thinking about how to translate the goals and the desires of their career into functional, actual actions in their day in and day out experience. If you're interested in any of that, I really encourage you to sign up for our newsletter, the Katie Coaching Foundations. It's free 99 and you can sign Once you sign up, you will get one of these top tier, best performing, most cited newsletters from that period of time in your inbox every two weeks. I share these because I know honestly, a lot of people are never going to sign up for Get That Grant. A lot of people are not going to be able to access the coaching we do because we're unapologetically focused on women of color faculty in academic medicine. But hey, I still want to help our entire field. I want to start a revolution. So if you haven't checked it out yet, definitely sign up at www.chemidol.com slash foundations to check out our career foundations series. Hello, hello, and welcome back to the show, folks. It's good to have you back. As you probably already know, because you hit play, I'm not alone today. I am with the lovely Dr. Lori Edwards, who's going to be chatting with us about her time as a coaching client, and I'm sure a lot of other things. I want y'all to know that she is basically a baby Shuri. This woman is like Wakandan level genius. When she first was telling me about her research, I was like, wait, you did what? Wait, what? This woman's got companies calling her. fire that's part of the reason why we did some coaching around that the inbox is on fire the request and the craziest thing about it is that she started like yesterday y'all like I'm not talking about somebody who's 15 20 25 years into her career no she started literally like three and a half days ago not really but she'll tell us about that but like a very brand new very high potential amazing energy just amazing possibility within the career of Dr. Lori Edwards and I really want y'all to listen to this episode so you can hear a about what it looks like to harness all of that, but still stay true to yourself. She's an incredible example of that. So without further ado, welcome Lori. Thank you. This is absolutely a dream come true. I love making dreams come true. I'm all into that. Okay. So I just gave them a preamble, but Lori, tell the good people about your specialty, where you work and what is the good work you do in the world? Love this question. I I am a pediatric anesthesiologist at the Johns Hopkins Hospital. My research focus is actually the improvement of the quality of care for pediatric patients undergoing anesthesia. But to be more specific, it pertains to the quantitative neuromuscular blockade monitoring practices. So my current projects focus on the effects of quantitative monitoring on the clinical decision-making and then creating a framework for implementation universally across the country, hopefully across the world, for implementing these monitors in every OR for our pediatric patients. That is my umbrella, my pitch, my post, everything. This is absolutely what my career is about. And I think I have a unique opportunity because my background is actually in quality improvement. And I have seen how quality improvement and clinical research can align. And I use the principles from both to create this framework and basically build buzz around using quantitative monitoring in pediatric patients. I just want to let y'all know that you heard correct that she said the world, that she is changing how all your babies get put to sleep and what happens afterwards. So Juan, we deeply appreciate you because it is terrifying when you have to put the littles under You're like, no, this is not right. So it's amazing. It's amazing on multiple levels. I only understand some of it to be honest, but what I do understand is the heart of it, which is about like how we care for our littles when they're under. And it's like, there's a lot of control. It feels like we relinquish and it feels like you're bringing some of that back in a way. So I love it. Yeah. So Lori, tell the people a little bit about what point in your career were you in your career when you started to consider coaching? I know. I love this story. And like, what was not working for you or what were you trying to prep for on the horizon for yourself? Well, I'm going to be very honest. I started thinking about coaching when I entered fellowship. I'm going to be honest. I know. I'm going to tell y'all, Kemi is serious about her people. Okay. She is serious about her people. But I knew like, even from that point that I did not have the tools to build a career that I wanted. It was clear to me just by listening to the podcast. I ate, slept, breathed the podcast. Definitely. It changed my perspective. It gave me a different perception of what academic medicine could be like for me. And I just knew I wanted it. I didn't know how it was going to look. I didn't know where it was going to take me, but I knew what I wanted at that point. And it wasn't the dream that they were selling me. It wasn't the pervasive focus on the clinical work for the first two years, you'll always have time for research. I didn't want that. I wanted to hit the ground running because I felt like my time was now. And to be very honest with you, even though I had that feeling and I knew what I wanted at that point, I still was hesitant to actually do the process. I'm going to be honest. From fellowship, I filled out that application form I'm going to be honest with you. I know. In a Word document. And I did not go forward with the application. I didn't send it in until a year after I had already started. Yep. A year after I had already started because I had seen what I needed to see and it wasn't for me. I wanted something different. Okay. This is so interesting. Okay. Let's unpack this. This is so funny because I also like, you know, I batch these episodes. And so it's like, I just went to somebody who is like 50 15, like 18 years deep in their career. And I'm speaking to you. And this is like, it's so fascinating to compare the two. So Lori, you said when you began fellowship, you were like, I'm listening to the podcast. Y'all don't have what I need. I am clear on that. I'm clear on that. And this is not necessarily aligning with the messages. I'm hearing messages like, like you gave a great, I was going to ask you for an example, but you gave a great example. You'll always have time to do research, focus on your clinical. Like y'all, that is a lie. I just want to be sure that That we all understand that it does not work that way. Anyway, so you're hearing that and you're like, okay, I want something different. But then I think what I heard you say is like, you were clear as a trainee, even beginning your training, like, okay, this is something I need. But then when you started, you started the application, but waited a whole year before completing. So I would love to understand, or tell us a little bit about what do you think was that pause that was like staying your hand, that was like holding you back from being like, submit this application and let's go. Ooh. So this is a deep one for me. I struggled with whether I was truly that high achieving woman of color in academic medicine. And when I look back to that time, as in I compare where I am now, and this is the power of reflection, when I compare where I am now to back then, I have the same dreams, same aspirations, same pitch when it comes to my research goals, but the difference and what the program gave me is the confidence to know that I do belong. And I didn't have that, but I always had a feeling that I was going to do something more. And in order to do something more, I needed the tools to set me on the right path. Yes. Even though I didn't believe that I had that ability, there was something telling me. Just go. You need more. Just go do it scared. Do it. I was going to say, this sounds a lot like do it scared. It sounds a lot like the very first coaching lesson, which is like, do it scared, do it anyway. You know, what I was thinking as you were saying is that like, I don't know if this is a saying or not, but this is what came to me is like, if you want to do things differently, you have to do things differently. You know what I mean? It's like, you want to do things differently. You got to do different things. That's literally part of it. And so I think that's what you're kind of embodying, you know, like, which is that difference between knowing, oh, I have the awareness. I've listened to the podcast. Like I have the awareness. I'm listening to what y'all are saying that don't sound like it is right. I feel like there's more in me. The difference between the awareness and the action of like, this feeling is now creating an action. I'm embodying this and I'm going to actually do something differently. It's not unlike when I was speaking with Lisa and we were talking about like, you can be deep in your career and have awareness of all of these ways things could be better, but no action in actually making them happen. And I think your show showing what that looks like early on, it can look a lot like confidence. It can look a lot like this break between what I want and the confidence I have to go after something. I think later in careers, it looks more like inertia. It looks more like resentment, right? It can look more like bitterness, but it's the same thing. It's the same issue. I know it, but I'm not doing it. You know what I mean? Yes, it's exactly that. Because I'm someone who's very used to being told, oh, you can't do that. And it just, it makes me want to do it more. I mean, from... residency oh you would never match into an anesthesia program okay did it anyway yeah oh you're gonna do peds anesthesia nobody does that you don't need to do a fellowship in order to take care of children under anesthesia did it anyway my research project as a resident gonna be honest I said I would never do research but I had a chair of my department who was like hey I know you said you don't do research but I know you're passionate about improving your environment So let's do this project that is geared toward improving my environment, in your environment. Environment. Yeah. And it changed the entire trajectory of my life. Yes. Based on the topics that we have coached. I'm like, wait, who is in your environment? Like, wait, wait, back up. This is major. Like, yes. So first of all, it doesn't surprise me that you have that. I mean, I think we have to have it. I think, especially as Black women in academic medicine, you have to have a oh, so-and-so told me I couldn't do it, so let me just go do it. If you don't, I think that you have stopped before you started. You cannot get anywhere if you don't already have that, because the messages are both explicit and implicit that this is not for you. It's like if there's a buffet, it's like only this part of it is for you. This is for the other people who really belong here. I feel like it's a little bit different. Sometimes I think people talk about this almost like I'm not allowed in the door, and I don't think it looks like that anymore. I think it looks like you're out in the door, but you can only be 25%. Like you can only access this part. You don't get all this stuff. So I hear you saying like, that doesn't stop me. You know, like I had to be able to move forward. I had to be able to do all that. And I think that the other side of that, Lori, I think the other side of that is that when you know, you're capable of doing that, you can have a distorted boundary on when to put it down. That's the issue. It's like, it is an amazing skill. it is amazing strength I will not like minimize that like a lot of people cannot do that cannot be like oh you said I can't let me show you I'm gonna do it for years not for a day not for a moment but for years and years and years but the problem is we develop that muscle so strongly it is so powerful that we don't know how to put it down so now anybody who wants us to do anything in any way is getting a yes because at the end of the day you're right you can do it. It's just at what cost? Because you can do it. Yep. Let's move on to these questions. Next question is, Lori, share with us a moment or more than one in Get That Grant where something really shifted for you in a meaningful way. So the first one that comes to mind, and this one I wrote to my heart's content. It was the moment that I realized that I belonged. Oh, tell us more. I was like suddenly just thrown into this space of women that I thought I was just going to be intimidated by and be like, oh my gosh, what am I doing here? False. Nope. Because we don't do that in our communities. Let me tell y'all that. From the jump, we're like, everybody needs to go ahead. Continue. Sorry. No, it's okay. I literally felt like, it might sound cheesy, like a Hallmark card, but it felt like home. Yes. We laughed together. We cheered each other on. We problem solved together. Yes. They thought like me. They had the same expectations for their careers that I did. They put the same pressures on themselves and they have the same thing to prove to themselves. Yep. And every conversation, every post, it just lit a fire. The fire was just burning and burning every single time. I would leave those coaching calls, Kemi, and I'm just like, woo, let's go.

UNKNOWN: 17:48

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00: 17:48

Yes. Let's go. I would literally be like, you know, that meme that's like, let's go. That was every single time I would go on these calls and they would fill my cup and there is nothing like it. I have never experienced anything like it in my entire life. And it shifted things for me in a big way, more than confidence. I can't even describe it. It was literally like someone struck a match and lit my passion Oh, I love it. around the world person, we can't measure that impact. The number of eyes, the number of people, the number of people, like it's immeasurable. So first of all, that is what gives me goosebumps actually is because it's not just like me and you talking. It's when I think about now you go and move through the world. Now you go and move through your career and all of the ripple effects after that is incredible. The second thing I want to say is I think part of the power of what you just described of getting into the community and feeling the resonance immediately and being like wait a minute is that we have had too many experiences where we're supposed to be similar on superficial level so people are like oh you know we're doing a diversity thing come through blah blah blah or whatever it is right women in anesthesia or you know like whatever like marker you want the first year fellows all those things like we have all experienced this where it's like oh no we're going to gather all these quote unquote like my folks, right? Based on these very superficial parameters and you get in. And of course you're like, don't belong here because of X, because of Y, right? There are all these reasons why it's like, this does not apply to me, whatever. So you do not have a sense of belonging. I think the hesitation, which I totally understand is people are like, no, I've done this before. Like, I don't want to be the person teaching people, or I don't want to be the person who's still the odd one out or all those things. But the difference is, and I think what you're describing the consequence of is that we don't match on superficial like you said you opened a word document to fill out your application like part of the things that we are screening for is that resonance does this community fit with you and what you're trying to do and what we do here and how you think about your work and the place of it and the purpose of what you're trying to do and how you try to accomplish things right now like all of these questions are really intentional and it's really funny because like there are applications every cycle that literally don't get through because people literally don't write nothing. Like literally, like if you're going to answer the question with one line, this is not going to work for you. Even just think about the program itself. Like you're not going to get any transformation going through our modules, answering one word answers, click, click, click, definitely don't spend your money. Like I'm trying to help you keep that money because you're not going to get anything out of this. So I think what you're describing in a really beautiful way for people so they can like almost feel it is what it feels like to be matched, to be into a curated community that is curated beyond the superficial that is curated around like a common shared purpose and like passion people have an outlook and perspective and challenge and so all of a sudden you go from I'm the only one with this challenge in this way to oh it's all of us and we're about to knock this out I really think there's nothing like helping somebody through a problem that you know you have because you're like wait a minute all of Excuses are on the floor. Like there's nothing else to do. And it's like the opposite of the academic, like let's bond over complaining with no solutions. To me, it's like, that is our, you know, like the upside down. It's like the exact opposite of that conversation is like, we're going to talk about a challenge, but because we all experience it, we all have tools and we're in this environment, we're walking away with solutions. You're absolutely right. And then the other moment that I can remember that really shifted things for me, that purpose mantra. I can tell you now when we hit that lesson, I was faced with a decision. I was offered a position as an assistant program director for our core residency program. And I'm just like, this is a good opportunity. But now I have my purpose mantra. How does it fit? And through making that purpose mantra, I had to tune out everyone else because the go-to is you can't do everything.

SPEAKER_01: 22:49

And

SPEAKER_00: 22:51

I was just like, no, I don't fit into a box. I've never fit into a box. Don't put me in a box because nope, going to be successful. I know the skills that I bring to the table. And I feel like if I don't take advantage of the opportunities that align with my purpose, I'm not only doing myself a disservice, but the people who could have benefited from what I could bring to the table would also be at a disservice. If you're my person, purpose mantra, the decision was very easy. I spent a week, a whole week. But that day that I came up with my purpose mantra, I was able to see how it fit with what I had in mind in my career. I was able to see how I could make it fit with the time that I had now with the research that I was doing now. And it was a no brainer. It was literally a no brainer. What you're talking about is not just the decision power, but it's the strategy. Because what it does is that it gives your brain a different job so instead of like should i do this and make this person mad or should i do this because it's too much or is this person right or wrong these like very binary things that don't ever they don't ever overlap correctly they're always going to contradict each other when you have the purpose mantra in the way that we teach it and the way that we create it and the way that we teach you how to operationalize it you are doing way more complicated executive purposeful thinking you know what i mean it's like okay let's think about what we're doing, what your goals are, where you're trying to go, what the impact is, the how, the why, the whatever. Now let's take this opportunity. And it's like art. It's like, okay, so let's see, how does this weave or not weave? It's like you automatically see like, oh, this thread literally doesn't go on the canvas. Like this doesn't have anything to do with what I'm doing. And so opportunities that other people are like, this is a no brainer. You got to do it. You're like, literally, we're not doing this. Like, if I want to be really blunt, it's like, I'm making a blue canvas. This is yellow. It does not go. You know what I mean? And then the opposite is also true. And somebody's like, oh, you can't, you can't. It's impossible. It's impossible. But if you are starting to get used to, if you learn, and then you get used to this literally cognitive practice of how this thing fits in, then you weave it in and it does fit because you see, you're like, oh no, no, no. I see all the ways that my energy and the work overlap. All you see is an additional burden. What I see is integration. Yes. It's more to do, but like, it's not in the same way that you think about it's not like a one-to-one oh god now I have this other thing on my plate it's like no I've integrated this well and then of course I'm getting more out of it right now of course there's also more bounty on the other side of what that's kind of what I'm hearing you talk about is like this other function of it which to me is like the strategizing that goes past like who am I upsetting is it too much you know what I mean yeah because I think the fulfillment that I get from the role is unmatched but I think the most important thing to me is is seeing the passion that these residents have to improve the specialty and being in a unique position to not only have had the same experiences as them, had the same thoughts and fears, been sold the same academic medicine dream as them, but I'm in a unique position to say that doesn't have to be you. And if you want to be a change maker, you can. And it doesn't have to be on nights and weekends. Lori, what you said there, it energizes you. You know this because you've been to get that grant, but I think the elephant in the room that's missing from all productivity stuff out there is energy. It's like, none of this matters. I don't care what your productivity strategy is. Who cares if you don't know how to design your time, your schedules, your weeks around your energy? If you don't even know how to assess your energy, what matters? What you're saying is somebody can look at this and be like, oh, it's a whole nother role. It's going to drain you, girl. There's so much to do. You got paperwork, you got meetings with residents, whatever. And you're sitting there like, but if that work energizes me, do you see how I'm more productive, not less? So it's like, there's this entire other variable that just gets left behind. And I think it gets left behind because during training, nobody cares about your energy. You're either on a 24 hour shift or you're not. Girl, are you breathing? That's what energy is. Are you breathing? Is your heart beating at an appropriate level? then you got energy, right? Your brain does not even have to be functioning. So I just, I have to make sure I say it with empathy, but I think even more so than maybe like corporate, maybe like these other places, like in medicine, we are so skewed to the level of like, just work hard, just do it, do it, do it at all physical, all exhaustion. Like everybody has crazy stories of what they did in training to get through it. We're so skewed that my point is that like, we are like deeply, deeply disconnected from this idea. It's not just like, oh, I haven't thought about it. It's like, girl, I don't even know. What is that? So I think the fact that it came out as part of the process that people go through with us is like, you start to see, again, not this very like, oh, will there be more meetings on my calendar? But it's almost like 2D to 3D. Like we're talking three dimensional, but what's your energy though? So then it's like, we're totally, we're operating at a different level. Anyway, I've said enough there, but everything you give me is so rich. Okay. So I think the next question is, What do you have now that you didn't have before embarking on coaching? I know we've talked about confidence, but maybe are there other things that you want to share with us? Ooh, this one I was waiting to tell you because I think this is the biggest part, the part that I struggled the most with. That lesson was rough, but I now have CEO energy. I call it something else. I had to reframe it. I call it my unicorn time, but now I can sit down, look at my calendar and be like, okay, we need to change this training mindset. What are you going to do in the time that you have?

SPEAKER_01: 28:54

Yep.

SPEAKER_00: 28:55

Period. And that was something I've never, ever, ever had before. If this was me a year ago, I don't know how, how I would make it work. I don't know how multiple projects. Where? Oh no. I would have been overwhelmed. And even now I know how to manage it. So I get into these projects and I start new things and I have new ideas and I might start to feel overwhelmed, but I know now overwhelmed means that I need to prioritize. Exactly. Overwhelmed is not a state of being for you anymore. It's just an indicator, right? You don't just live in a sea of overwhelm. You're like, oh, I feel, I'm feeling the overwhelm. Okay. It's a barometer. Yeah. I tell people, it's not about like, you will never feel overwhelmed anymore. It's like, you will notice it as an aberration and be like, wait, what's going on? And then you'll have the tools to back up and be like, all right, let's do my assessment. Let's do my alignment check. You know what I mean? Like, you know exactly what you need to do to figure out what happened. And then also, so that helps you going forward. Like, okay, that's a good note because I just learned something about X task or I just learned something about X person or whatever. It's also like you're learning and getting better and better as you go. Yeah. I mean, I'm still growing. I'm still learning how to really make it effective. But it is something that I never knew that I could even do. Exactly. The tools to build a roadmap for myself, make decisions confidently. Yep. The Lori of 2023, 2022, she wasn't able to do it. She was not going to be able to make it work. And I just knew early on, I need these tools and they're tried and true. And you got them. I love it. I love it. I mean, you don't know them because we're not taught them. I think it's important. And honestly, this is why I'm always so amazed when trainees listen because I'm like, this is not really compatible with what we want, what most training programs want trainees to be able to do. I'll say that. And so I understand that people come out and need reprogramming. Yeah, it's like, thus, please avail yourself. Like, y'all, I don't care if you do get that grant or not. It's not about that. Do something. Like, recognize that if the default is to do nothing, just recognize how much you are oriented to suffer to be successful. Just at least recognize that and then just go get help wherever you want. Go learn wherever you want. But I just don't want people. And this is what broke my heart and why I started this whole thing to be like, I'm doing everything I feel like I'm supposed to be doing and may even be quote successful. And I

SPEAKER_01: 31:34

hate it.

SPEAKER_00: 31:34

Yeah. And I'm exhausted. And like, maybe it starts out as only 10% exhaustion and hate. And then by your third year, it's 20%. And then by five years on faculty, you hate half of your job. And then they're like, oh, the statistics show that women leave the workplace and women of color, especially. And it's like, of course, you know what I mean? Like the default trajectory is to either abandon yourself and settle for the rest of your career, abandon yourself completely, or to have to leave to hold onto yourself. I feel like the only way I can hold onto myself is to leave. And I just want to create a middle path. Like, oh my God. And this is why I think my work as an associate program director is so important because at the end of the day there's so many residents i don't even know if people have this bird's eye view that i have the opportunity to have there's so many residents with passions to change i bet so laurie yeah and you know what happens they go into the workplace they don't have these tools they're stared into heavily clinical careers and you know what they do they leave academic medicine and their ideas their hopes their dreams their legacy leaves with them. Exactly. These papers, you know, publishing papers. Okay. They mean one thing, but you know, the most important thing to me is the legacy that I leave behind. What I say in some of these residents in order to create a constant improvement in our specialty. If we can burn them out. Exactly. And if we continue to tell them this. Girl, don't get me started on this rant. What is the plan? Oh, So what is the plan? So after we burn all these folks out, after we keep lying to them about what this job is, about what is required, what the expectations are, if we keep selling them this dream that literally does not exist anymore, not in, I don't know, not in 2024. I'm sorry. I don't know when it did, but I know by the time I started, it was gone. Okay. So like, what is the plan? Like, I want somebody to sit down and tell me what's the long-term plan here, because I agree with you. We're losing the ideas that we need to remake it. That's the problem. All the passion, all the purpose oriented folks, the equity oriented folks, the quality oriented folks, like all these people who are like, there's so much potential here. You burn them all out. What is left? You don't have anybody to change anything, to improve anything. Where are the ideas coming from? Burned out people who are using the last vestiges of their brain cell to put together the agenda for the committee that's supposed to be on transforming people's experiences. Girl, what are we doing? What

SPEAKER_01: 34:20

are

SPEAKER_00: 34:20

we

SPEAKER_01: 34:21

doing?

SPEAKER_00: 34:21

You don't know what I'm talking about. You're like, so the wellness committee is meeting at 5 p.m. Okay. Or 7 a.m. Okay. I think we've lost already. I think we should just acknowledge now we've lost.

UNKNOWN: 34:37

I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_00: 34:38

It's the end of my day. I'm punchy. I'm just like. But it's true. But yeah, it's really true. Okay. So last question. What advice would you give a woman of color for faculty like you, maybe somebody like you who've been listening to the pod and they're just like, I don't know if I'm high achieving either. I'm not really sure. But they signed up anyway. What should they do to get the most out of it? What if they come on and they're just like, I don't know, Lori, everybody here really is smarter than me. Ooh, okay. This is a good one because I really had to do some reflection to answer this question. I would tell them, remember that time that you sat down and you did that application because y'all, I ain't gonna lie, that application is... Tell them, I don't care. Yeah, no, listen to her because I'm tired of people coming through talking about, it's not a click box. No. It is not. Because we're trying to create the experience that you had. So we have to get to know you. Anyway, go ahead. But it's true. It's like, remember that you that sat down because it took me a couple hours, that sat down and wrote those things that you wanted, wrote those things that you're currently doing. Assess yourself in a systematic way. There are like multiple domains of assessment. Yes, continue. Exactly. So you remember that you, she bet on herself. So when you step into this program, this is your opportunity to get the tools you need to grab your career by the horns because we were thrown into a car. We don't know how to drive, but now we're getting a manual. The car's pulled over to the side of the There it is. We've got a manual in front of us that is tried and true. This manual says, hey, I've been at point A. I know how to get you to point B. You just have to do the work. So you've got to go back to that you that filled out that application. Remember why you did what you did. And take the tools, run with them. Run. The lessons are tough. Even the uptake is tough. But you have to go back to why you did the program in the first place. That is so true. is really it. And also y'all be doing hard things all the time. So this is where the hard ass Gabby comes in. I'm like, excuse me. I'm sorry. What residency program did you finish? Like, this is why I work with who I work with though. Because you know, I don't know. I can't just go anywhere and say that, but I can go. I said, no, not these people. My academic medicine people don't eat. Please stop talking right now because I went through training too. I know what it's like. So it's hard in a different way, but here's the thing. Here's what got you through training. You're like, this is really hard, but this will change the rest of my life. That's what it is, Lori, right? You're like, oh my gosh, you want me to do how many shifts and how many days? You know what I mean? I still remember those, let me not say the number of hours, you know, labor and delivery shifts. There were 32 labor and delivery rooms, 32 active labor and delivery rooms. You are running around like an insane person. Okay. For 24 plus hours. Okay. Like I remember, and I also remember having like a visceral understanding. This is the pathway to change my life forever. Like Once I come through this, I'm not the same. This is the same idea thing. It's like, yes, this is hard. It's hard to do the uptake. It's hard to think about like, okay, I gotta do this shift. I gotta like really be courageous. But in the same way, it changes everything you approach in your career going forward. You can't undo it. You can't do it and be like, it's unseen. You can't unsee it. You know what I mean? Like it's like that. And so that also becomes part of the motive is like the same way you use that motivation before, like you use it the same way. And to be clear, maybe I should have you say this. You're not talking about like, oh, it's so much time. I was up at 3 a.m. It's not that. Why don't you tell them just a little bit so they get the understanding? Like when you say it's hard, like what is the hard? Oh, so it's not the actual like going through the course and reading the material. It is the actual, I'm going to have to change the way I do this. Yes, I'm going to have to do different things. Like it's going to feel unnatural. It's going to feel natural. It's going to feel more. It's going to be like, is she really asking me to wait a minute now? Yeah. So it's like, you're going to be okay. Cause you're not alone. You're going to do this alongside everybody else. You've got examples. Our coaches all have done this. Every single one of them have walked through this. Nobody's shouting at you from outside being like, yes, I mean, I've worked with a lot of these kinds of people and I heard this word. No, it's like, girl, I was in this too. Everybody has been in this. And that I think is what really creates that feeling of like capacity. Like, okay, I can do this. Like, you know what I mean? Like you see enough people be like, okay, girl, like we gonna do this. And And I think that that creates, I don't think I know, it catalyzes a lot of the courage that is required, which is why it's a group. Because otherwise, as I have said before on the podcast, you will spend weeks and months and months and months trying to make changes that one of the lessons covers, topless of six months worth of lessons. So yeah. Lori, this was so wonderful. Was there anything else you wanted to share with us before we wrap up? One more thing, I have to shout out the GTG buddies. I don't know how you guys brought us to and how you selected how we get together, but- Thoughtfully. We will be my people forever. I love that. When it comes to the harder lessons, we all struggled with the same lessons. Yes. We would come together on WhatsApp and be like, girl. She wants us to do what? We're going to ask for more time. Ooh, I don't know. I don't know. We were all in very demanding- Yes. That's why you're together. Yeah. And we both have the same pressures. We got to, we were at the same time, some 6am WhatsApp messages, but Hey, but I think just knowing that they also were struggling too, and we would come together and problem solve and brainstorm. It's different. I don't think it's something that you can get from any other program. It is community. It is tools. When you look at our coaches, you can see what the program does in life. does in their life exactly exactly thank you so much laurie i love shout out to laurie's coaching buddy shout out y'all we love y'all too i love it so much i think just for all the reasons it's just been so lovely to speak with you today i am so just thrilled to continue to watch your career just take off blossom all the things all the things that you do and i feel honored i feel so lucky that you submitted the application like i feel like i'm like who is okay this woman came she was not playing nobody's games. And I, that's such a good feeling for me because that's what we all want actually is like when you do your work, like you want to do your work with people who want to do the work. That's the feeling I get back from working with such dynamic, amazing people. So, all right, take care. It was so good speaking with you. Bye. Bye. Hello. I'm coming through to remind you that we are starting a listener letter segment on the Your Unapologetic career podcast, write in with questions that you have. You can ask me anything. I will decide what I want to answer. You can bring forth challenging situations or suggest topics you might want to hear more about. To do that, you can reach me at podcast at kdolcoach.com. That's podcast at kdolcoach.com with your questions. Please note if you'd like to be anonymous and I will always do my best to keep you so excited to hear from y'all bye