Peak Protocols: An Arena Labs Series
Arena Labs has spent years bringing experts from high-pressure, high-stakes fields to teach on the frontlines of healthcare. Now, we're capturing the best insights and tools from those experts and making them available beyond the hospitals where we work.
Peak Protocols: An Arena Labs Series
FBI Lessons for Frontline Medicine with Sarah Draper
What can the FBI teach us about performance in healthcare? A lot more than you might think.
In this episode, Sarah Draper, a West Point graduate, Army veteran, and former FBI Special Agent, joins us to unpack what it takes to lead and last in high-stakes, high-consequence environments. After a 20-year career investigating national security threats and training the world’s top law enforcement leaders, Sarah turned her focus to medicine, coaching hundreds of physicians and nurses on sustainable performance.
We explore how disciplines used in tactical environments—like mental rehearsal, mission clarity, physiological readiness, and post-critical event recovery—translate directly to clinical settings such as trauma bays, ICUs, and ORs.
Sarah also shares what she’s learned from years of coaching frontline medical teams: the patterns of burnout, the practices that build resilience, and the small habits that sustain long-term effectiveness.
If you’re in the arena of high-stakes care, or leading those who are, this conversation will leave you thinking differently about how to prepare, perform, and recover.
Got thoughts, questions, or big ideas? Reach out to the team at Arena Labs.