Physician Coaching

• 1-Hour, Private, On-Line Sessions  (preferably away from work environment)
• Convenient, Flexible Scheduling  (days, evenings, weekends) 
• Confidential Conversations  (speak freely, process & debrief challenges confidentially)

• 7 Sessions Over 3 Months (scheduled at your convenience)
• Samples of All Coaching Areas: Communication, Professional Strategies, Self-Care
• Continuing Modules on Targeted Topics Available After Intro

• Month-to-Month Scheduling,  No Long-Term Commitment
• 2-3 Sessions Per Month   (scheduled at your convenience)
• Targeted Topics   (specific skills for challenging situations, customized for individual)
• Organizational Contracts or Private Clients Accepted

Evidence-based approaches for more satisfying professional and personal interactions.

We respect your experience as a physician, and recognize that everyone has a personal style of communication.  Our program builds on your strengths, and offers practical ideas based on validated research and the experience of other doctors.  You may find these skills make communication more effective and satisfying with patients, co-workers, and at home-- because communication skills are life skills.

Some patients have trouble comprehending important information, even when physicians do their best to communicate clearly. These sessions teach specific skills that build patient comprehension, to increase adherence and improve clinical outcomes.  

Patients exposed to these techniques report that their doctor explained things in a way they could understand.  Physicians who develop these communication habits report increased satisfaction and feelings that they were able to ‘get through’ to patients more effectively.

• Enhancing Language Clarity
• Effective Teach-Back
• Connecting Through Interpretation
• Delivering Serious News
• Advance Care Planning
• Neurodivergent Communication

Physicians may listen to every word, yet the patient doesn’t feel their doctor was listening.  These sessions teach habits to help patients recognize that you’re listening carefully. 

When patients feel respected and heard, they’re more likely to follow advice that affects their clinical outcome.  Physicians practicing these key behaviors have also reported that they improve communication in other areas of life.

• How to Help Someone Feel Heard
• Creating a Joint Agenda
• Care Signaling
• Responding to Emotion
• Managing Unrealistic Expectations
• Communication During Physical Exam

Some people present behavioral challenges that complicate efforts to provide good clinical care. These sessions practice skills to deal with challenging conversations in a way that’s efficient and satisfying.  

Patients and family benefit from skillful direction when these circumstances come up, and can be helped to re-align decisions and behaviors.  Physicians feel more confident and better prepared when they have tools to make challenging conversations more effective and satisfying.

• Conflict, Compassion and Boundaries
• Conversation Exit Strategies
• Empathetic Behaviors that Connect
• Discussing Health Behaviors
• Effective Family Conferences
• Goals of Care Communication

Communication skills are life skills.  When we learn to use communication tools skillfully, there are many places at home and at work where they will be useful.

Physicians can benefit from communication strategies to make conversations more comfortable with peers, consultants, administrators, nurses, medical assistants, advance practice providers, front desk staff and others-- everyone in the healthcare continuum at work.

• Managing Workplace Conflict
• Better Email Communication
• Communicating in Online Meetings
• Presentations and Public Speaking
• Giving and Receiving Feedback
• Communicating Across Neurotypes

Coaching to enhance professional satisfaction and address challenging work environments.

Strategies are needed to maintain resilience in a stressful work environment.  Even when we cannot control the elements causing stress, we can use processes that build, sustain and energize our capacity to manage it.  

Grounded in research and literature on physician coaching, this module explores some speific skills to support resilience in the stressful world of healthcare.

• Medical Charting and Inbox Support
• Dealing with Negative Feedback and Complaints
• Processing Patient Death and Difficult Cases
• Disclosing and Discussing Medical Error
• Managing Med Mal Stress
• The Third Shift: Work-Life Integration

When personal values conflict with workplace demands the result can be demoralizing.  Coaching explores strategies to expand a personal sense of competence, relatedness and autonomy.  These elements of self-determination are critical in addressing the moral mis-match many experience in their work environment.

• Overscheduled and Understaffed
• Challenges with Leadership
• Surviving Difficult Transitions
• Loss of Autonomy with Patient Care
• Abusive Environments in Medicine
• Navigating Social Inequities at Work

Personal mission and passion in medicine can go through many phases during a career., but it doesn't have to erode with the pressures of workplace stress.  Specific coaching can build, sustain and energize your professional vision, and challenge you to move toward your own greater good. 

• Vision, Values, and Voice in Medicine
• Rich Language Exercises
• Arrows and Lenses
• Professional Identity
• Gratitude, Growth, and Generosity

Practical ways to manage stress in the moment, and support long-term wellbeing.

Consistently managing smaller episodes of stress in the moment has beneficial long-term effects.  Coaching lets us practice self-care techniques in advance, so the habit will come easily when we need a skillful response to stress.  Learning to use long-term processes and systems of self-care can further strengthen our well-being and happiness.  

We'll practice a series of validated techniques to discharge stress in the moment and engage the parasympathetic nervous system instead of holding on to tension.

• 1-Minute Resets for Busy Professionals
• Breath, Muscle, and Vocal Releases
• Sleep Initiation Techniques
• Beyond Exercise: Sing, Play, Laugh

Brief reflective exercises can calm feelings of anxiety or anger, prevent escalation of emotions, and facilitate clearer decisions. Learning to use reflective metaphors can help to process stress.

• Self-Awareness Exercises
• Reframing Imposter Thoughts
• Retraining the Internal Critic
• Replacing Rumination with Healthy Reflection

These evidence-based techniques can help to calm intrusive thoughts, manage intense feelings, and choose healthy behaviors with a positive focus, supporting short and long-term self-care.  

• Managing the Stress-Anger Cycle
• Grounding Exercises
• Narrative Comfort Circles
• Reflection Exercises

Use the contact page on this website to tell us about your area of interest.  We'll follow up to arrange an information session to discuss pricing and answer your questions.