The “Gut Check”

As leaders in healthcare organizations, we often need to take the time to pause and have a gut check; these can be with ourselves, our staff, our leadership. Most recently I had our department do a check on our overall outlook: Who is looking toward decreasing workload, retirement, life changes that will alter the productivity of our team? We looked also at the wish list we are looking to accomplish within the next five years, referring to our mission, vision, values and strategic plan for the organization. Where will we expand regionally, what investment are we capable of making, and what is the return?

Most importantly, as leaders we tend to forget to gut check within ourselves. Are we where we want to be? Are we looking to further our education, obtain additional certification, again, what is the investment and what is the return?

Taking time for ourselves seems an unattainable goal most days, performing these gut checks give us a little reprieve from the day to day business, and look within ourselves as well as our business to see the potential.

Blog post by WHCM Steering Committee Member Jen Pendleton