In many ways, influence is a big part of being a physician, from getting our patients to follow our treatment plans, to negotiating a package that reflects our worth. Actually, influence is key to communicating in just about every area of our lives, but how do we foster and develop it?

There’s a range of outcomes that can happen for you in a negotiation, and you want to end up in the space that’s closest to your goals. Influence is the key to getting that result, and walking out with a good deal.

What steps can we take to maximize our influence skills, and how will it improve the negotiation process?

In this episode, I talk about the role influence plays in getting what you want at the negotiating table.

Three Things You’ll Learn In This Episode 

• Why criticism can be harmful
  What’s the difference between being constructive and being critical in a negotiation?
  
  
• How to start the negotiation on the right foot
  Beginning a negotiation on common ground sets you...

In a perfect world, our jobs will move and progress along with us. In reality, when we grow as people, it’s natural to realize that the job has not kept up.

When your job feels like it’s out of alignment with your priorities and your values, there are many options to course correct. We owe it to ourselves to advocate for change on our behalf.

How do we check in with ourselves and uncover misalignment between our lives and careers? Why do we need to make sure our priorities match what we do day in and day out?

In this episode, I talk about the importance of making your job line up with you, and what to do when it doesn’t. 

Three Things You’ll Learn In This Episode 

• The power of growth
  Why do periods of growth force us to reevaluate our priorities, and what can we learn from it?
  
  
• Why you need to check in with yourself regularly
  How do you uncover a misalignment between your career and your life before it becomes catastrophic? 
  
  
• How to...

Human beings have a knack for telling ourselves stories about what we’re capable of, and very often, these stories are so concrete they start to feel an awful lot like truth.

As real as they feel, doubt-filled and self-defeatist beliefs are NOT indisputable truths. Until we separate the two and challenge the stories, we’ll get tripped up by them, and struggle to nail our negotiations.

How do you dig deep into your belief system and pull out the stories that get in your way?

In this episode, I’m going to share a simple exercise that will help you advocate for yourself instead of selling yourself short. 

Three Things You’ll Learn In This Episode 

• The best mindset for a successful negotiation
  Your pre-game mental framework is an important piece of a successful negotiation. How do you identify the deep-rooted beliefs that are secretly running the show and affecting your confidence? 
  
  
• How to shift to a better story 
  When the stories we tell...

To get paid what we’re worth, we often have to renegotiate our current salary and ask for a raise, but how do you even bring it up and start that conversation.

It’s natural to feel a bit unsure and even nervous about approaching your employer to discuss compensation, but if you elegantly lay the groundwork, you can bring yourself closer to the outcome you want.

What is the right (and wrong) time for this conversation? How do you set the stage for as much success as humanly possible?

In this episode, I share how to start the conversation about getting a raise and helpful tips and tricks I’ve learned along the way.  
 

Three Things You’ll Learn In This Episode 

• Why you shouldn’t bring a raise up out of the blue
  Humans in general and people in power especially, don’t like to be caught off guard. How do you set yourself up for a better outcome by prefacing the conversation? 
  
  
• How to get a better package if money isn’t on the...

When a physician quits their job, it’s usually not as simple as handing in your resignation letter and riding off into the sunset. Most of us are contractually obligated to stay for up to 180 days. That’s a REALLY long time to work while you wait for your exit, so how do you make it bearable?

Your notice period can be your worst nightmare, or an opportunity to close a chapter on your own terms. The experience you have is completely within your control.

Is there such a thing as “quitting well”? How can we plan for our exit ahead of time and leave the job gracefully?

In today’s episode, I talk about how to shift your mindset and leave your job on the best terms possible. 

Things You’ll Learn In This Episode 

• How to leave a job on your own terms
  What’s the difference between being forced to quit and ending a chapter deliberately, intentionally and on your terms?
  
  
• Why patients need to be our top priority
  In the last days of our...

The oppressive structures in our world don't just just exist on a societal level. They also show up in medicine, and oftentimes, we unknowingly internalize them.

When parts of our identity differ from the society's assumption of what a doctor looks like, going to bat for ourselves can be an uphill battle.

How do we identify ours and others internalized biases? Why does this become a hurdle to us getting paid what we’re worth and optimizing our contracts?

In this episode, we’re going to explore how our marginalized identities can affect the way we feel about ourselves as physicians, and what we deserve in a negotiation.

Three Things You’ll Learn In This Episode 

• How to identify internalized negative beliefs
  What are marginalized identities and how do they impact how our capabilities are viewed?  
  
  
• The cost of internalized bias
  How do internalized biases diminish our value and hold us back from optimizing our contracts?
  
  
• Why internalized bias is sometimes...

In the career trajectory of female physicians, we constantly feel the need to do more to be successful. Whether that's seeing more patients, having more on our daily agenda, or working harder for an equal salary. But what if all this extra work is coming at the expense of much needed, well-deserved rest?

If we don’t actively prioritize periods of rest, and we don’t take pauses, we’re setting ourselves up for failure.

How do you know if you’re missing out on opportunities for rest? What are the facets of rest we often ignore, but need to focus on?

In this episode, we’re going to talk about how to deliberately plan for rest, and practical ways to bring rest into work day. 

Three Things You’ll Learn In This Episode  

• How to get the most out of the schedule you negotiated for
  A beautiful schedule filled with vacation days and four-day weeks is only great if you make use of it. Are you squandering much-needed rest time and...

In coaching, there’s a concept known as ‘The Manual’ - an unspoken set of rules we hold other people to without their knowledge. 

In a negotiation scenario, this line of thinking can be problematic, counter-productive and destructive to our ability to really advocate for ourselves.

Our employers aren’t automatically aware of the specific core values we bring to an organization. Expecting them to “just know” erodes our confidence, and holds us back from optimizing our employment outcomes. 

How do we practically stop basing our success on how other people respond? How do we shift towards a more beneficial and empowering mindset? 

In this episode, I talk about why assumptions set us up for failure, and how to optimize what you control. 

Three Things You’ll Learn In This Episode 

• The danger of trying to control other people in negotiation
  Why is it hard to fully advocate ourselves in a negotiation when we’re...

Negotiation can either be an antagonistic, competitive tug-of-war, or a relationship-building process where two sides come together in an agreement based on value. 

Even though it sounds contradictory, the greatest barrier to a successful negotiation is the fear of conflict, and if we want to sharpen our agreement-making skills, getting comfortable with it is essential. 

How do we fully advocate for ourselves without alienating the other party? What are the most counter-productive things we have to avoid in negotiation? 

In today’s episode, I’m joined by Bill Sanders, the author of a great new negotiation book, Creative Conflict. He shares why our learned aversion to conflict holds us back in negotiation, and how to overcome it. 

Three Things You’ll Learn In This Episode 

• The power of small agreements and small wins
  How do we move a stalled negotiation forward leveraging high-value, low effort trade-offs? 
  
  
• How to...

The pandemic brought on a lot of changes that directly affected physicians, but as we slowly start to recover from the crisis, data around the real impact is starting to emerge. 

Thanks to the latest MGMA DataDive, we have a ton of interesting and even promising trends to consider and work with. 

There was a collective concern around how badly compensation would backslide because of the global crisis, but the data isn’t as bad as we thought it would be.

What does this data tell us about how different areas of medicine were impacted by the pandemic, and how we can use the information in our negotiations? 

In this episode, I do a deep dive into the latest MGMA DataDive, and why it’s still possible for us to earn what we’re worth as we collectively recover.

Three Things You’ll Learn In This Episode 

• Why we can still get paid what we’re worth 
  Many physicians are being told they can’t get increases because of the financial...