Focus

“Make the best decision that you can with the information that’s available to you at the time, and, above all, do the right thing.” (Lee Scott, CEO for WalMart, when talking to his upper management about responding to the Katrina disaster.)

I feel like I’ve made it clear that I work for amazing, inspiring people. The CEO and President of our hospital believes in radical, loving care and has proven this in multiple ways. Our CIO/CMIO takes time to meet with little old peabodies like me and even hand over some of his favorite books for inspiration and encouragement. My boss sends me to leadership training classes and my manager helps me pick out the master’s program that is right for me. I am blessed.

Well today I was once again reminded of this. Today in my department meeting our CIO gave us three questions to think about. And he said that we really needed to think about them, write them down, and keep coming back to them. He even handed out paper and pens (although I already had my notebook and purple pen at the ready – I am regularly inspired by these meetings and have kicked myself before for not taking notes). He said that it’s proven if you write down your goals, you are more likely to make them happen.

So he left us with these three questions that he thinks we should continually be thinking about and working on:

1.       What is the most important thing to you in your personal life?

2.       What is the most important thing to you in your current job or future career?

3.       What is the change you want to see in the world? Honestly, what do you want to leave behind?

Some of these will overlap. You should be constantly doing something to improve these three areas. What are you doing to make progress on these goals?

He left us, saying “Focus. There is a lot of noise out there.”

So today over lunch I grabbed the book he lent me, The Checklist Manifesto, turned off my radio, and read.

I sat in his office nearly a month ago and told him that I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do here, but that I wanted to be here. More than anything, I want to be a caregiver here at this place that I believe in. And although I can’t stand in a patient’s room while blood is being drawn without passing out, and I am not even close to being smart enough to be allowed in a surgery room, I want to be here. He smiled, tossed me a few books, gave me a short list of instructions, and said that he would see me soon.

I have my checklist for point number two.