Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Podcast / Building Sustainable Leadership and Executive Resilience in Healthcare with Brett Antczak

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Building Sustainable Leadership and Executive Resilience in Healthcare with Brett Antczak · Becker’s Healthcare Podcast

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  - There's a small circle of people who truly
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  - understand what it takes to lead a health
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  - system right now. The decisions are enormous.
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  - The variables are constantly shifting, and the stakes
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  - of getting a call wrong don't stay contained.
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  - That's not a complaint. It's a structural reality.
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  - And it's why the most effective c suite
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  - leaders are deliberate about where they go to
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  - pressure test their thinking.
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  - Becker's fourteenth annual CEO and CFO roundtable
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  - brings together more than 1,500
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  - executive level attendees
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  - and nearly 400 speakers for four days built
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  - around growth, financial sustainability,
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  - workforce strategy, and the leadership questions that don't
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  - have easy answers.
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  - Join us November second through the fifth in
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  - Chicago.
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  - For the agenda and event details,
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  - visit beckershospitalreview.com
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  - and click on the events tab in the
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  - upper right.
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  - Hello, and welcome to the Becker's Healthcare podcast.
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  - My name is Chanel Banger. And today, I'm
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  - excited to speak with Brett Anzac,
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  - an executive coach and founder of Age of
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  - Advantage,
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  - who joins us today to speak
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  - about sustainable leadership and executive resilience in health
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  - care. Brett, thank you so much for joining
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  - me today. Hi, Chanel. Thank you so much
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  - for having me. It's an honor to be
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  - with you.
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  - Perfect. Well, to get us started out, could
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  - you please introduce yourself and tell us a
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  - bit about your career in health care?
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  - Oh, you bet. I'm Brett Anzak, and I've
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  - spent,
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  - almost thirty years in small business ownership and
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  - hospital leadership, including serving as a CEO.
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  - And I would did that mainly in the
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  - rural hospital or critical access hospital space, and
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  - I built what looked like a great life
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  - from the outside. The title, the income, the
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  - reputation, I I had it all. But somewhere
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  - along the way, I realized that success and
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  - the fulfillment just really aren't the same thing.
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  - And so that realization has become my mission.
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  - And today as the founder of Age of
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  - Advantage where I work with other high achieving
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  - executives,
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  - I work with them to start building a
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  - life that feels as good as it looks.
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  - And, one of the exciting new things that
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  - I've accomplished off my bucket list is I've
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  - also completed my new book,
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  - architecting the sovereign leader, which ties in with
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  - that executive coaching program that I've put together.
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  - Thank you so much for the introduction. And
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  - so you spoke about how you made that
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  - shift from running a critical access hospital to
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  - coaching c suite leaders.
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  - What was the catalyst that happened that made
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  - you make that shift?
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  - Well, you know, as
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  - from the view of the CEO office, from
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  - one of the little tiny critical access hospitals,
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  - it's really kind of a unique vantage point.
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  - You know, it's it's not part of, you
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  - know, the big
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  - glitzy, polished hospitals that, you know, so many
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  - people think about.
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  - It's really the community's lifeline.
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  - And for years,
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  - I thought I had really reached the pinnacle
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  - of my service, and I was just doing
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  - really great as a CEO.
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  - But as I look back at it, what
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  - I really was is I was just what
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  - I call a heroic fixer.
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  - I was the one that stabilized the chaos.
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  - I was just bridging the budget gaps. I
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  - was helping keeping the ER staff, recruiting docs
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  - for the clinic.
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  - But while I was busy fixing all of
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  - that around me,
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  - what I noticed,
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  - you know, if I can use a financial
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  - term, my internal balance sheet was really moving
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  - in towards insolvency.
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  - And I remember one late night sitting in
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  - my office and lights are humming and, you
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  - know, everyone else had left.
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  - And I had this kind of an odd
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  - analogy come to mind that I was really
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  - the human heat sink for the entire operation,
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  - which which, you know, a heat sink is
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  - the one that absorbs everything.
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  - And I was the one absorbing the anxiety
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  - for the town,
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  - the issues from the physicians, demands from the
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  - board. And so really on paper, I was
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  - doing great,
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  - but internally, I was a structural disaster.
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  - And so from that, I realized we often
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  - mistake success for sustainability.
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  - And
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  - what was coming to mind is that we
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  - assume always, you know, as we look at
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  - executives
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  - that
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  - they're they're happy, they're doing great. And because
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  - they're winning, they look from the outside like
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  - they're strong and doing great.
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  - But I know from that moment, you know,
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  - all of us often on the inside have
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  - things that we need to fix.
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  - And so as I continue to work with
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  - my other leaders and especially the ones in
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  - my c suite,
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  - I help them to make those kind of
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  - shifts as well. And, now I'm excited to
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  - kinda take those programs and ideas to other
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  - people to help them shift out of that
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  - rut and find better balance in their life.
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  - Got it. Got it. Thank you so much
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  - for walking us through that. And now at
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  - the top of the call, before we start
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  - recording, you
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  - framed burnout as an architectural problem rather than
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  - a wellness problem. What do you mean by
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  - that, and why does that distinction matter for
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  - hospital leaders specifically?
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  - Oh, you bet. This this is kinda one
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  - of those real interesting thoughts.
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  - As a hospital executive,
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  - the standard advice we get, you know, from
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  - our board or well meaning folks
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  - is they say, you know, when you're exhausted,
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  - oh, just take a vacation, just practice some
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  - self care, go to yoga,
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  - learn to meditate.
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  - But burnout isn't really a wellness issue. It's
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  - really more of a structural collapse.
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  - And, Chanel, if you think about it like
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  - a bridge, the bridge doesn't collapse because it's
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  - lacking strength.
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  - It collapses because it's lacking symmetry and there's
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  - weakness within it.
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  - So in the pursuit
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  - of mastery, most health care executives
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  - allow their internal structures to become dangerously lopsided,
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  - and they optimize everything for their career, their
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  - vocation, for the hospital,
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  - while things like their health, their love and
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  - relationships, their personal freedoms just undergo systemic collapse.
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  - And so when you treat burnout like an
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  - architectural
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  - problem,
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  - you can really stop trying to put the
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  - band aid on exhaustion by just saying, oh,
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  - take a vacation.
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  - And what you really need to do and
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  - change your mindset about
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  - is start redesigning the foundation of your life.
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  - And where you look at where the load
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  - bearing walls in life are placed,
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  - a lot of sovereign leaders,
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  - just are creating structural symmetry
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  - that or a sovereign leader creates symmetry across
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  - all of those different areas of their life
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  - as opposed to just getting lopsided and only
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  - focusing on their career.
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  - Got it. Got it. And now digging a
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  - little bit deeper into that, what is the
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  - single biggest mistake you see high performing health
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  - care executives making right now, and what is
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  - the cost of that mistake?
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  - You bet.
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  - Having been there, I've lived this, and I've
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  - I've watched many of my friends live this
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  - as well.
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  - And a lot of us as health care
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  - executives,
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  - we spend our lives, really solving today's problems
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  - or maybe even just looking at the strategic
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  - vision for our facilities,
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  - but we never take time to intentionally design
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  - a future that we actually want
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  - or create a life that that we want
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  - to be living.
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  - And so the the biggest mistake is staying
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  - trapped in the identity of, you know, what
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  - I would call my old life that heroic
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  - fixer.
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  - We become conditioned to believe that leadership is
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  - just reacting to the fires or the problems
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  - and just getting folks over those
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  - emergency issues. And it it's really just becomes
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  - a negotiation with chaos
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  - is the way I I felt and the
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  - way I kinda see it in my mind.
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  - And what's really interesting is a lot of
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  - executives
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  - and leaders throughout these organizations,
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  - they wear that exhaustion like a badge of
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  - honor.
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  - Like they're being super effective or they're working
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  - really hard.
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  - And the cost of that mistake is massive
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  - because not only does it lead to the
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  - structural collapse like we were just talking about,
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  - but organizationally,
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  - it can really be devastating.
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  - Because when you look at that executive leadership
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  - team,
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  - they're really the engine of that entire organization.
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  - And when they're exhausted
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  - or when they're not
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  - truly functional
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  - in their
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  - lives, they become a single point of failure.
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  - And so when you're that hero fixer, you're
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  - really the bottleneck.
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  - And the mark of truly sovereign design
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  - is an organization that can function with clarity,
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  - more speed,
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  - and grace when that executive or that leader
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  - walks out the door. They they can function
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  - without them.
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  - And so the goal really of sovereign leadership
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  - is to make yourself increasingly
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  - unnecessary.
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  - But oftentimes, what happens, and and I've I've
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  - been there, you know, sadly. You know, the
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  - executive ego fights that every step of the
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  - way. You know, we wanna be indispensable,
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  - but we really have to learn to practice
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  - what I call identity liquidity,
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  - where we're firing the version of ourselves that
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  - got us to that point,
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  - as the executive.
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  - And we really need to create a next
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  - version of ourselves
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  - that's creating the legacy that we want to
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  - leave with our organization.
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  - I love that. So kind of surrounding yourself
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  - with people that you can trust and depend
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  - on while not burning yourself out at the
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  - same time.
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  - And,
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  - kind of a different question here. So you
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  - have a master class called mastery beyond the
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  - boardroom.
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  - Who is it for, and what does somebody
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  - walk away with after going to it?
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  - You bet. So mastery beyond the boardroom is
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  - really built specifically for that high performing leader
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  - who's winning professionally
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  - but losing personally, you know, against those other
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  - domains, you know, their love and relationships, their
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  - personal
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  - time freedoms, maybe their health and well-being.
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  - And what I've really tried to do is
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  - design it for that CEO, the CFO, the
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  - CNO, or really
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  - any executive
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  - who's tired of running on that treadmill of
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  - the crisis management, and they just need to
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  - reclaim strategic command of their life.
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  - So what I've done in the master class,
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  - we take blueprints and some of the concepts
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  - from my book, Architecting the Sovereign Leader.
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  - And then I've tied that into other frameworks
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  - for my executive reset program and my VIP
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  - programs,
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  - and then we're able to apply them directly
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  - to the executive's life.
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  - So with,
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  - my mastery beyond the boardroom
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  - program, they walk away with concrete tools,
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  - from you know, for example, they use how
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  - to you, use what I call the vagal
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  - break, which is a a breathing technique
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  - to regulate their nervous system under pressure, and
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  - they learn to incorporate language of success into
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  - their thinking and when they're communicating with others.
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  - And these techniques
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  - and the
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  - the framework can really be used not only
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  - just for vocation,
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  - but it can you be used in all
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  - areas of our life.
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  - And then as that true sovereign leader, we
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  - can take those principles and that language of
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  - success and then teach that to our leadership
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  - teams,
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  - and, we can create much higher functioning organizations.
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  - And so it creates really that internal structural
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  - symmetry
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  - that gives that,
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  - that strength,
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  - and it helps us bridge, you know, from
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  - what's gotten us to this point in life
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  - to really where we want to be going,
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  - in the next steps of our career.
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  - And so it it it's able to help
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  - us not only personally but professionally
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  - to become better balanced, which allows us to
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  - really become a better leader for our organization.
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  - And for those of us in rural health
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  - care, these small critical access hospitals, it helps
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  - us to be stronger and, better support for
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  - our communities as well.
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  - I love that. And for the health care
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  - leaders listening who are exhausted and questioning how
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  - much longer they can operate at this pace,
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  - what's the first change you'd recommend to help
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  - them lead sustainably?
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  - You bet. So it's I think all of
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  - us have those
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  - moments,
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  - you know, and I I was telling a
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  - little bit about my story where I remember
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  - sitting in my office one night having my
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  - moment.
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  - I give that the term, you know, really
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  - notice what you're noticing.
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  - And within us, you know, that discontent you
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  - might be feeling or the exhaustion is not
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  - a sign as an executive that we're weak
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  - or we're failing,
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  - but it it's really valuable data,
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  - that your body is trying to give to
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  - you. And, for example, in the health care
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  - world, we always tell our patients never ignore
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  - the signs of an MI or or heart
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  - attack or a stroke.
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  - But oftentimes, what we'll do is we'll ignore
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  - those inner signals that our body is sending
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  - us.
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  - And it's that inner signal
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  - that our body is sending us that tells
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  - us our outer life is really needing an
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  - update.
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  - And so instead of, continuing to be stuck
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  - in the past
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  - or, you know, dealing with your old wounds
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  - or being hostage
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  - to, you know, the chaos that's really going
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  - on in your hospital every day,
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  - By implementing the the framework and the principles
• 13:26
  - that I teach, you know, first starting to
• 13:28
  - notice what you're noticing,
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  - you can start moving towards that point where
• 13:32
  - you can be the visionary,
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  - for your new personal and professional abundance.
• 13:37
  - And so as you start noticing what you're
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  - noticing
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  - and then act on the signals
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  - that your body is giving to you, you
• 13:46
  - become ready to stop managing the decline and
• 13:49
  - moving more into that exhaustion or burnout state
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  - that so many of us wind up in,
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  - and you can start,
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  - really architecting your ascent,
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  - to becoming that sovereign leader.
• 14:01
  - And, if if folks would like more information,
• 14:04
  - you know, I'm I'm just throwing out just
• 14:05
  - a couple principles of the framework here. But
• 14:07
  - if you'd like more information, you can always
• 14:09
  - visit us at ageofadvantage.com
• 14:11
  - and join this mastery of the boardroom
• 14:14
  - program that I've got.
• 14:16
  - And one thing that when I'm talking with
• 14:18
  - other executives, I always like to remind them,
• 14:21
  - and it creates a good visual image for
• 14:23
  - us,
• 14:24
  - that oftentimes
• 14:26
  - it's
• 14:27
  - it's we reach that point where we need
• 14:29
  - to stop sacrificing our health, our and our
• 14:32
  - relationships on the altar of our vocation.
• 14:35
  - And we need to just really start
• 14:37
  - beginning to lead from the power of being
• 14:40
  - a sovereign leader
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  - instead. And really all of that just starts
• 14:44
  - with noticing what you're noticing
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  - and acting on it.
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  - Absolutely.
• 14:50
  - And so as we wrap up, is there
• 14:52
  - anything else that listeners should know? And can
• 14:54
  - you state
• 14:55
  - again the name of the book and where
• 14:58
  - people can find it and also,
• 15:00
  - where people can find more about Mastery Beyond
• 15:03
  - the Boardroom?
• 15:04
  - You bet. So,
• 15:06
  - the important thing to recognize
• 15:09
  - is as we give terms to our experiences
• 15:13
  - and as we identify
• 15:14
  - really what we're going through,
• 15:17
  - as executives, we create frameworks of support for
• 15:21
  - our leadership teams and everybody else.
• 15:24
  - And what I'm trying to create with Age
• 15:26
  - of Advantage
• 15:27
  - is really that support structure for our executive
• 15:31
  - leaders
• 15:32
  - to help us be able to move forward
• 15:34
  - and really create the legacy that we want
• 15:36
  - to leave in our organizations.
• 15:39
  - And,
• 15:40
  - folks can find more information
• 15:42
  - on my website. It's just ageofadvantage.com.
• 15:46
  - There's actually information there in my store
• 15:49
  - about Architecting the Sovereign Leader,
• 15:52
  - which is my new book.
• 15:54
  - And for Becker listeners,
• 15:56
  - if you use the code Becker 25,
• 15:59
  - it'll give you a 25%
• 16:00
  - off the book.
• 16:02
  - So you can go ahead and, you know,
• 16:03
  - purchase that with a discount and be able
• 16:05
  - to read a little bit more about it
• 16:07
  - there.
• 16:08
  - And the the one piece I would just
• 16:10
  - leave folks with
• 16:12
  - is just remember when we receive those inner
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  - signals,
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  - it doesn't mean we're weak. It doesn't mean
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  - that we're failing.
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  - But when our inner selves are telling us
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  - we need to change or something isn't working,
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  - we need to take action on that, just
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  - like we would really encourage,
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  - you know, our our patients to take actions
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  - when they receive those physical symptoms.
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  - Because if you if you let it fester,
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  - if you let it grow, the problems don't
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  - go away when we ignore them.
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  - And, you know, the better piece is really
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  - to take action and change your life.
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  - Because as a stronger leader, we're able to
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  - effect better change with our leadership teams,
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  - with our entire staff, with our patients,
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  - and within our communities.
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  - And as a leader, I think it's important
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  - that we are involved in that and helping
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  - to move everything forward.
• 17:02
  - Well, that's a great takeaway for our listeners
• 17:04
  - and a perfect note to end on. Brett,
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  - I wanna thank you once again for joining
• 17:08
  - us today and for sharing your insights on
• 17:10
  - the Becker's Healthcare podcast. Thank you so much.
• 17:12
  - Chanel, as usual, the pleasure is all mine.