Latest / Becker’s Healthcare Podcast / Marion Spears Karr on Gratitude Driven Leadership and Rethinking Executive Search

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Marion Spears Karr on Gratitude Driven Leadership and Rethinking Executive Search · Becker’s Healthcare Podcast

0:00
This is Scott Becker with the Beckers HealthCare
0:04
podcast.
0:05
I'm thrilled today to be joined by both
0:07
a a founder,
0:09
but also someone who's a leader in sort
0:11
of the the world of search and executive
0:13
leadership,
0:14
and just a terrific individual in person,
0:17
Marion Spears Carr.
0:20
Marion,
0:21
could you take a moment to tell us
0:23
about yourself and your background and and just
0:25
to introduce yourself?
0:27
Yeah. Thank you, Scott, and thanks for the
0:29
opportunity to to be with you and and
0:32
talk to your audience.
0:33
Yeah. I'm Mary and Spears Carr. I've been
0:35
in the executive search and leadership development space
0:38
in health care for thirty four years.
0:41
If you don't recognize the accent, I'm a
0:43
native in North Carolina, and I live in
0:45
the mountains of Georgia.
0:47
Been
0:49
in the staffing world and executive search side,
0:51
work with health care organizations, both
0:54
hospitals and physician practice, but also private equity,
0:56
startups,
0:58
med tech in a couple instances,
1:00
and, have been obsessed with leadership development,
1:04
and, started a couple companies. So that's,
1:07
that's my work.
1:09
And and and what inspired you to found
1:11
your company? What drove you to find it,
1:14
and and why was it ideal for you
1:17
to move
1:18
at that point to found the company and
1:20
come from idea to execution and building the
1:22
company?
1:24
Yeah. I I love that question because it
1:26
was
1:27
the company, Inflow Executives, is a a new
1:30
launch that I'd launched two years ago.
1:33
It's been in the back of my mind
1:34
for quite some time, and the idea was,
1:38
what if we could take all of this
1:41
experience in the executive search side plus all
1:44
of the work
1:45
and development work and leadership development side and
1:49
and create a company
1:52
that
1:53
had that look and feel of a of
1:54
a boutique retained search firm, but also was
1:57
embedded in organizations
2:00
at the table with them,
2:02
trusted adviser, and also helping them develop their
2:05
teams. And and and so it was this
2:07
idea of
2:08
what can we how can we marry these
2:10
two different interests of mine
2:13
that have been revenue
2:15
sources for me for a very long time
2:16
and multiple entities and then create a company
2:21
that
2:22
leverage those to make health care, particularly health
2:25
care companies that are in growth mode, medium
2:27
size, small size, or even large companies where
2:29
there was a segment of the work that
2:31
they were doing where they needed that level
2:33
of connection. So that's the whole idea of
2:37
Inflow executive is is is creating that that
2:40
environment
2:41
where we could do that type of work.
2:44
Fantastic. And you've done a wonderful job of
2:47
it.
2:48
Take a second on your own leadership style
2:52
and and how that's evolved over the years.
2:54
I've known you for a decade,
2:56
a terrific person,
2:58
one of the nicest, most gracious, sincere people.
3:01
They they have this book called The Go
3:03
Giver. You might as well have written that
3:05
book. Talk a little bit about your leadership
3:07
style and how that's evolved over the years.
3:10
I I ended up very,
3:13
I was very fortunate very young to have
3:15
some mentors
3:17
who
3:18
saw leadership as a skill set that I
3:20
had. And I'm not saying you're they're born
3:23
leaders and grown leaders. I I don't know
3:25
if I was a born leader, but there
3:26
were mentors of mine
3:29
that really drove my interest in in being
3:31
leadership in in a leadership capacity.
3:34
And the thing that
3:36
I learned from them that has has really
3:39
helped me
3:41
is their whole idea is if you can
3:44
bring value,
3:47
people you wanna lead, the people you want
3:49
to to follow you, the people you wanna
3:52
work with,
3:53
be it a customer, be it a client,
3:55
be
3:55
it your network, etcetera,
3:57
if you can find
3:59
a ways to support and grow them,
4:03
they're gonna follow you.
4:05
They're gonna more likely listen to what you
4:07
have to say or at least be open
4:08
to what you had to say. So that
4:10
was kind of the foundation of that and
4:11
where and how that's evolved.
4:14
It
4:15
now it's
4:17
it's how can I help other people grow,
4:21
organizations grow, but also
4:24
embed gratitude
4:25
through that process? And when when I really
4:27
locked in on gratitude as a key leadership
4:30
acumen, not just a feeling,
4:33
that's when
4:34
things really started to shine and work well
4:36
for me. So
4:38
help people grow, help people succeed
4:42
as long as it aligns with kind of
4:43
what you're trying to do and what you're
4:45
trying to grow, but then
4:46
embed gratitude as a key part of that
4:49
connection. You do that so well, Scott. You
4:51
think you
4:52
you're very much locked in on a gratitude
4:54
as a leadership skill set if you know
4:56
it or not.
4:57
But but talk about that for a second
4:59
because what happens is, I think for many
5:02
people, it's almost a glass half full a
5:04
glass half empty thing.
5:06
It's somewhat you have to naturally come around
5:08
to the concept of being really grateful for
5:10
those people that are involved with you in
5:13
any way, shape, or form.
5:15
Particularly, I'm involved with so many people that
5:17
are helpful, that are that are positive, and
5:19
they have a positive impact on my life.
5:21
Every once in a while, you,
5:23
run into people that you think of as
5:25
takers versus givers.
5:27
And, of course, it's it's hard to be
5:28
as thankful and grateful for them. But by
5:31
and large, people are are fantastic and a
5:33
pleasure, and you sort of view it as
5:34
everybody's trying.
5:36
And and so at some point, it becomes
5:37
natural, but it also becomes very intentional that
5:40
you're grateful to people because it's it's a
5:42
way of life, isn't it? It it is.
5:44
And I think one of the things that
5:46
we've learned through this this journey around understanding
5:49
gratitude as a as a as a leadership
5:52
skill set
5:54
is moving
5:55
gratitude, saying thank you, showing
5:59
graciousness to others,
6:01
moving it from habit
6:03
or manners
6:05
to ritual, to where it has a reason
6:10
to do that. So to your point,
6:13
as we think about gratitude from an intentional
6:15
perspective, is looking for those opportunities where we
6:18
can elevate
6:19
the other person, that we can help them
6:21
see something that they don't see then in
6:23
themselves
6:24
or see a process
6:25
that they've developed that they don't even realize
6:27
is so more valuable than even
6:30
than they see it. I I think
6:32
when you move
6:34
gratitude from being, you know, a nice way
6:37
to treat people
6:39
to being intentional to look for opportunities to
6:41
elevate others, like Chip and Dean Heath talked
6:43
about in their book,
6:45
the book that they had written around around
6:47
that topic.
6:49
But then
6:50
move that from being such a core value
6:54
that
6:55
it's embedded in everything you do.
6:58
That's where
6:59
I wanna go with it and where I
7:01
feel like we we we begin that journey
7:03
toward, to be honest with you. Yeah. No.
7:06
I think you do a wonderful job in
7:08
that. I think I remember first meeting you,
7:10
and you're always being so gracious by by
7:12
nature.
7:14
I I just find it to be so
7:15
natural for you.
7:17
How do people with that intentionality,
7:19
that naturalness of being grateful? You're you're you're
7:21
naturally one of those grateful one of the
7:23
things I love about you, I mean, I've
7:25
known you for years now, and it's always
7:27
you're always trying to help. You're always positive.
7:30
You're always encouraging.
7:31
And quite frankly, you never ask for anything.
7:34
You you never ask like, okay. Do this
7:36
for me. There's a there's a quid pro
7:37
quo with it. How do you develop that
7:39
naturalness, that that that intentionality,
7:41
that positiveness,
7:43
you know, in in in that right nature?
7:44
Because you do it so beautifully well. And
7:47
the thing I'm always reminded of is that
7:49
you're you're never asking me for favor. You're
7:51
never asking for something. You're just grateful by
7:53
nature and how you deal with people. And
7:56
is that
7:57
is that learned? Is that born? And and
8:00
if you're not born with that type of
8:02
attitude and positivity,
8:04
can you develop it intentionally?
8:07
Yeah. Great two questions there. First, for me,
8:09
I grew up in a a family that
8:11
where gratitude and our faith was so such
8:14
a core value. And I grew up in
8:16
the Mill Village of
8:18
of Concord, North Carolina in the textile industry.
8:21
Mom and dad both work in the cotton
8:22
mill. And I kinda grew up around people
8:24
who were just grateful for being alive, grateful
8:27
for what they had, always saying thanks, and
8:29
and being grateful.
8:31
And so for me, that's that was kind
8:32
of that that was, I guess, our foundation.
8:34
But I do think it could be learned.
8:36
And here's here's the way I talk about
8:39
it.
8:40
If we want to
8:42
grab hold of gratitude as a way to
8:45
to help others,
8:46
The first start stop on that journey is
8:50
to think about what you're grateful for. I
8:52
mean, everybody in our industry or any industry
8:55
for that matter, Scott,
8:57
they have something to be grateful for. Someone
9:00
helped them get where they are.
9:02
Someone opened the door for them or someone
9:05
said something that encouraged them or some you
9:07
know what you know what I mean? Like,
9:08
there's so much
9:10
there. And if we start to think about
9:11
it from that perspective, we start to think
9:12
about gratitude from from what we're grateful for,
9:17
there's this natural
9:19
piece within your brain that starts moving you
9:22
toward wanting to share that. So to your
9:25
point, the other point that you wanna that
9:27
not asking
9:29
not making an ask.
9:31
Here here's how I look at it.
9:33
If I bring value to a relationship
9:36
and I help someone
9:38
connect
9:40
or find the right opportunity or whatever it
9:42
is,
9:44
that's great.
9:45
And it's not just putting stuff out in
9:47
the universe that's gonna come back to you.
9:49
But over time,
9:51
you create
9:52
really this feeling of,
9:55
wow. He did something for me. He helped
9:57
me. Or
9:59
it just come it it you don't have
10:00
to ask. Right, Scott? You just don't. Like,
10:02
you don't have to ask.
10:04
It it will come back to you. And
10:06
if it only comes back in to you
10:09
in the in the from the concept of,
10:11
wow. You helped that person, then you need
10:13
to be good with that. And that's just
10:15
that's just how I look at it. Like,
10:17
if I can help someone and here's the
10:18
other thing, Scott, last part of that. When
10:20
you help someone,
10:22
if you do it intentionally, you also learn
10:25
something.
10:26
And and that's for me. I'm a brain
10:28
injury survivor
10:29
who had a brain injury when I was
10:31
18,
10:32
and I had to learn how to learn
10:34
again.
10:35
So I'm always trying to learn. You know?
10:37
I'm always trying to learn something. Every time
10:39
I help somebody, there's some learning experience around
10:42
it. So that's a long answer to your
10:43
short question, but
10:45
that's where gratitude really moves from being this
10:49
oh oh, he's such a nice guy to,
10:51
oh, that's valuable.
10:53
Oh,
10:54
that's important. But but but I left the
10:56
point that gratitude
10:59
in in doing the right thing
11:01
can't be a quid pro quo. It can't
11:04
be, I'm doing this. I'm thankful. I'm helping
11:06
this person with that person because it's gonna
11:08
help me.
11:09
That that's sort of the wrong way. The
11:11
the the the right way is I'm helpful
11:13
in a lot of different ways. It all
11:15
ends up working out. It's it's almost like
11:17
the karma concept. And, yes, you have to
11:19
be intentional about making a living, intentional about
11:21
feeding your family. But but there's a lot
11:23
of gratitude that doesn't have to have a
11:24
plus minus, just the right way to act,
11:26
the right way to behave. And you do
11:28
a wonderful job.
11:30
Talk about your business today, about Inflow.
11:32
And what are you most excited about with
11:34
the business today and who you're working with
11:37
and and clients? Are the clients mostly health
11:39
systems? Are the individuals looking for a position?
11:41
Is it coaching?
11:43
Where's the core of what you do today,
11:44
and what are you most excited about? Yeah.
11:46
So,
11:47
core our core business revenue and our primary
11:49
revenue is with in in being embedded in
11:53
growing health care companies. We still do some
11:55
one off searches. We do a number of
11:58
CEO searches for community and rural hospitals. That's
12:01
kind of a focus of ours.
12:03
It's not necessarily the domain of the big
12:05
players, you know, so we can we can
12:07
target that.
12:08
But what makes Inflow executive different is we
12:11
partner with companies that are in a high
12:13
growth mode,
12:14
be it a physician practice that's scaling across
12:17
a region or,
12:21
a home health company or or anything in
12:24
that regard. Again, common thread is they're patient
12:26
centered,
12:28
and we we actually embed
12:30
as a white label executive search firm internally.
12:34
To give you an example, we're working with
12:35
a,
12:36
a very fast growing urology practice
12:39
in the Carolinas.
12:40
We've been been been their white labeled partner
12:43
in house since December. We've already placed a
12:46
chief technology officer,
12:48
two senior
12:50
financial accounting key people within their team,
12:53
and we just had a CFO start last
12:56
last week. So we had four people already
13:00
in this organization, and we have multiple physician
13:02
practice
13:03
opportunities for them. We we basically, Inflow executives
13:06
is a key talent adviser
13:09
internal
13:10
to the organization over a six month, nine
13:12
month, one year contract
13:14
type thing. So what we've done is we've
13:15
taken
13:17
the quality of retained search
13:19
and mold put it into a mold where
13:21
you can completely embed it in a company
13:23
that has multiple needs over a period of
13:25
time.
13:26
That's exciting because it's a is it's it's
13:29
it's it's the new concept. It's the idea
13:31
that we had.
13:32
What's got me crazy excited, though, is
13:37
my authentic gratitude communication framework,
13:40
leadership training. We partnered with a couple major
13:43
health systems to do the research,
13:46
one in Texas,
13:48
very large nonprofit where we're using this gratitude
13:52
structure,
13:53
and we're researching
13:55
how we can teach leaders to reframe
13:58
how they communicate
14:00
to change behaviors within their teams,
14:04
both to support a culture of safety,
14:06
clinical excellence,
14:08
risk mitigation. And there's so much to that.
14:11
And it started as a concept,
14:13
and now we're kinda in that
14:16
proof now we're proving it with research. So
14:18
those are the two things. That's really what
14:20
we do. Inflow executives is the is the
14:23
from a search perspective, is this
14:26
company that will come into your medium or
14:29
or even a large company that has a
14:30
a segment that they need very focused on
14:33
and partner with you internally
14:36
on the search side. And then from leadership
14:38
development side is is building
14:41
teams that are focused on gratitude, focused on
14:43
communication,
14:45
focused on developing a culture of accomplishment.
14:48
And that's that's the that's the two things
14:50
we do.
14:52
Thank you. And and and take a second
14:54
time.
14:55
What advice would you give to emerging leaders
14:58
who are trying to be great in leadership,
15:00
whether it's the CEO of a health system,
15:03
the the
15:04
the
15:05
division head of a gastroenterology
15:07
practice,
15:08
a physician? What advice do you give people
15:10
that that are emerging leaders?
15:13
Correct. I love that question too. And, Scott,
15:15
you I've alluded to this and some information
15:17
I've sent you over the time over over
15:20
over our relationship.
15:22
I'm a student of flow theory, of being
15:24
in flow. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's
15:26
theory around flow theory around
15:29
when we have a command and control over
15:30
our skills
15:32
and we're up to the challenge, we can
15:34
be fully locked in. We lose all track
15:36
of time. We feel this
15:38
autotelic
15:39
experience where we're we're feeling self worth being
15:42
developed, etcetera.
15:44
He also talked about the fact that when
15:46
we own a set of skills that are
15:47
not being
15:48
used appropriately to the role,
15:51
that we can either be in a state
15:52
of anxiety
15:53
and and and and and conflict, or we
15:57
can be in a state of boredom and
15:58
apathy.
15:59
Why is that important? To emerging leaders, they
16:02
need to pay attention to when they feel
16:04
in a state of anxiety or conflict,
16:07
and they need to pay attention to when
16:09
they feel bored
16:11
or somewhat apathetic about the work they're doing
16:13
because that's gonna give them clues about the
16:15
skills that they really
16:18
own
16:19
the most that they wanna work with. So
16:21
as an emerging leader, the more you can
16:24
focus on
16:25
the skills that support your self worth, the
16:27
skills that develop you as a leader, you
16:30
can lean in heavy on those for a
16:32
higher success rate
16:34
within the role that you're playing and identify
16:36
roles that matter and will matter to you
16:39
long term. So think about it from the
16:41
flow perspective.
16:42
Emerging leaders need to pay attention. It's not
16:45
to say we're not gonna have this time
16:47
at time we're gonna be bored or be
16:48
apathetic. But over a long period of time,
16:51
if the role we're in or the company
16:53
we're in or the or the group that
16:55
we're in puts us in that state for
16:57
a very long time, performance is gonna drop,
16:59
and we're gonna fail.
17:00
In the same light, that's gonna happen in
17:02
the state where we're over challenged. So
17:06
for emerging leaders, start paying attention to those
17:08
things and then start building on that foundation
17:11
of the things you really do well.
17:14
If if somebody would have told me that,
17:17
I don't know, when I was in my
17:18
twenties or thirties, I might have, like, glossed
17:21
over it. But
17:22
the older I've gotten and the more I've
17:24
talked to leaders
17:25
around that, the more I realize it's so
17:28
true. To give you one last example on
17:30
that, Scott, when people are fired in our
17:32
industry in health care,
17:34
there's a lot of different myriad reasons.
17:37
But I I would suspect if you
17:40
pulled that group of people that got exited
17:43
for performance,
17:44
they would tell you they were either in
17:46
a state of anxiety at a high level
17:48
for a lot of their their work
17:50
or they were in a role that
17:53
didn't leverage the skills they really like to
17:55
use and they were in the state of
17:56
apathy or boredom.
17:58
I don't have any that's anecdotal. That's just
18:00
over years when I talk to people who
18:02
lose their job.
18:04
But I think
18:05
as an emerging leader, understanding what puts you
18:08
in flow, what glocks you in,
18:10
and what your core values are in in
18:12
alignment with that, that's the thing to grow
18:15
from as a leader.
18:17
Just my opinion.
18:18
No. And and I and I absolutely
18:20
love that. I I've always said about
18:23
leaders.
18:24
If they're not engaged
18:26
for example, if you have a great talented
18:27
person in your organization
18:29
and they don't have a clear role, some
18:31
leadership role,
18:32
at some point, they'll get disjointed.
18:34
And at some point, they'll probably walk,
18:36
you know, out the door
18:39
because they weren't engaged fully because they didn't
18:41
have an opportunity to to to strive and
18:42
to do what they're supposed to be doing.
18:44
And I think that's right on. And, obviously,
18:46
if you see that in yourself,
18:48
you're bored, you're not engaged, you're not fully
18:49
after it. Or the flip side, which I
18:52
find myself doing sometimes, is being overscheduled,
18:55
overburdened.
18:56
Either way can lead to sort of the
18:58
the wrong kind of engagement,
19:00
either
19:01
under involved, under passionate, or over scheduled, either
19:04
one.
19:04
And I think managing that in oneself is
19:06
a great team and a great challenge. I
19:08
I I absolutely love that.
19:10
Well, thank you for that. You're welcome. You're
19:13
welcome. I think
19:15
I think if we if we if we
19:16
could teach that more, if we could teach
19:18
people to really lock in on their on
19:19
their skills that they own, and there's so
19:21
many ways you could do that. But
19:23
but just
19:24
take your job description and get a highlighter
19:27
out and highlight three things on your job
19:30
description that you really, really like to do,
19:33
and then highlight everything you hate or dislike.
19:37
If the job description is is like
19:41
hundreds of lines of you, just I hate
19:44
this, I don't like this, I don't like
19:45
to do that, etcetera, then you probably have
19:47
to find a different job. And if you're
19:50
a leader
19:51
and you've got someone who owns a whole
19:53
bunch of skills
19:54
that you're not leveraging, you're doing them a
19:56
disfavor.
19:58
That's not fair to them.
20:00
And and, you know, back to inflow, for
20:02
example, that's one of the things we do
20:03
is we we see ourselves as problem solvers
20:06
when we're embedded in an organization. They may
20:08
say they need x, but what they really
20:10
need is y.
20:12
Let's go find somebody and write the job
20:13
description around that person as opposed to trying
20:16
to find somebody to fit a job description
20:17
that's not really the problem you're trying to
20:19
solve. That's a whole another discussion we could
20:22
have on another day.
20:25
No. Just absolutely fascinating. Mary, where can people
20:28
learn more about you and your company?
20:30
Best place is to connect with me on
20:32
LinkedIn.
20:33
I spend a lot of my time there.
20:35
Inflow executive's website is actually in we're rebuilding
20:38
it. We actually took it down because we
20:40
we didn't feel like we were telling our
20:41
story.
20:42
But find me, Marion Spears Carr,
20:45
only k a r r. Marion Spears, k
20:47
a r r that I know on on
20:49
LinkedIn. That's the best place to look, and
20:51
you can learn a little bit about the
20:53
company. Company's small. We're a start up now,
20:54
but we we believe we have a model
20:56
that that's gonna be scalable, and and and
21:00
we will be building,
21:02
our team over the next three years. And
21:03
so, yeah, just connect with me on LinkedIn.
21:05
That's the best way. And,
21:07
send me a connect request, and, we'll we'll
21:09
definitely connect.
21:11
Marion, great pleasure to visit you as always.
21:13
Thank you for joining us today on the
21:14
Becker's Healthcare Podcast. You're the best of the
21:16
best. Thank you for joining us. Thank you
21:18
so much, Scott. Thanks for having me on
21:19
the on the show, and and I really
21:21
appreciate you very much. I look forward to
21:22
seeing you at the conference soon. Thank you.