Is Anxiety Impeding You From Creating Healthy Professional Relationships? Featuring Adam Wiseman
Is anxiety impeding you? Create healthy professional relationships. Anxiety can affect all of our different professional relationships and hold us back from success. Whether it’s our clients, co-workers, managers, or vendors. Anxiety will also affect our productivity when interdependent relationships are needed. Toxic people and relationships can be turned around with the right tools.
Table of contents (Must open episode for these links to work)
About Adam
Adam Wiseman PMP, CHE
Founder and Lead Consultant
Quality Mental health Interventions Training and Consulting
Adam Wiseman is a sought-after international speaker with more than 20 years of experience working with adults living with mental illness and other intersecting challenges. He managed the Forensic Assertive Community Treatment Programs at Canada’s largest Mental Health organization and spent several years as a professor of Community Mental Health Case Management at George Brown College.
In 2018 he founded Quality Mental health Interventions Training and Consulting which focuses on workplace mental health and teaching the mental health skills necessary to turn “toxic” relationships with clients and colleagues into productive ones.
Adam is a senior-level Nonviolent Crisis Intervention Instructor, Suicide Alertness trainer, and is certified in Mental Health Law in the workplace from Osgoode Hall Law School and as a Psychological Health and Safety in the Workplace Advisor from the Canadian Mental Health Association.
He has trained members of organizations ranging from financial planners and ombudsmen in the financial sector to Court Support Officers and Toronto Police Services. He also offers online training including a one-day certificate course in Mental Health for Professional Relationships.
When he is tending to his own mental health he enjoys fishing, his dog Lucy, and spending time with his family.
Contacts
Quality Mental Health Interventions Training and Consulting Website
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Full Transcript Below
Is Anxiety Impeding You From Creating Healthy Professional Relationship Featuring Adam Wiseman
Thu, 7/22 12:48PM • 1:08:19
Estimated reading time: 61 minutes
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
people, mental health, mental illness, anxiety, productive, called, talking, day, employer, person, important, company, staff, living, professional, home, line, thought, clients, mentioned, is anxiety impeding you, healthy professional relationships, self-medication, self-medicating
SPEAKERS
Adam, Roy Barker
Introduction
Roy Barker 00:06 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Hello, and welcome to another episode of The Business of Business Podcast. I’m your host Roy. Of course, we are the podcast that brings you a wide variety of guests. That speak to a diverse set of topics. Hopefully, we can bring something to light maybe you haven’t thought about.
Or conversely. If you have something that’s keeping you awake at night. Hopefully, we can provide you a solution to that. Today we are blessed to have Adam Wiseman. He is the founder and lead consultant of Quality Mental Health Interventions, Training and Consulting. He is a sought-after international speaker. With more than 20 years experience working with adults living with mental illness and other intersecting challenges.
Adam managed the forensic assertive community treatment programs at Canada’s largest mental health organization. And spent several years as a Professor of Community Mental Health Case Management at George Brown College. In 2018. He founded Quality Mental Health Interventions, Training and Consulting. Which focuses on workplace mental health and teaching the mental health skills necessary to turn toxic relationships with clients and colleagues into productive one.
He is also a Senior Level, Nonviolent Crisis Intervention Instructor Suicide, Alertness Trainer. And is a Certified Mental Health Law in the Workplace from Osgoode Hall Law as a Psychological Health and Safety in the Workplace Advisor from the Canadian Mental Health Association. Adam, thank you so much for being with us. We certainly do appreciate it.
Adam 01:42
Thanks so much, Roy. I’m looking forward to having a chat today.
Roy Barker 01:45 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Yeah, and it’s, you know, we had just a little mental health experience. Just now with some technical issues that you know. And before we get off into that. I want you to tell me a little bit about, you know, how you got here. Kind of what was your road, and you know, what you do to help companies right now?
Adam’s Story
Adam 02:06
Sure. So the way I got here was like most people. In my family, there was someone living with mental illness. Who, you know, as much as it was inspiring. It was also quite frustrating the lack of services that were available and what was out there. That’s what initially got me interested in mental health and mental illness. So I started, I’ve worked in a variety of settings, I worked in group homes, I worked in employment. And then I started working as a case manager with the Canadian Mental Health Association. And that’s really where I really started to fall in love with the work.
So I stayed. I was with them for about 17 years. Frontline for about 10. And then spent the balance in management. Running the forensic mental health program. And forensic mental health is for people who aren’t familiar. When somebody commits a crime. And they’re found not criminal in Canada. We call it not criminally responsible. Because it’s acknowledged that the crime occurred due to their mental illness. Not due to them making a sound rational decision. That they, you know, thought about 1/4, which, which has different outcomes.
And it’s very challenging. I mean, it’s it’s underfunded, you deal with staff burnout all the time. You know, COVID has given the world sort of a new appreciation for nurses. But it’s one that I had, going back many years. Because seeing them working in the mental health sector is just amazing. What they go through. And equally amazing, is the patients and the clients that we get to work with. And the challenges that they have. That they’re able to, you know, come forward and live productive lives and achieve, you know. The goals they set out for themselves. And that was really our role.
However, included in that role is also monitoring for safety. Specifically, safety for the clients and for others, to work with this population. Where addictions are incredibly high as well. You really had to develop some very specific skills. In large part, it’s around how do you help someone achieve the goals that they’ve set for themselves. When they’re also sometimes going to be their own worst enemy. So if you think about. Like, anytime you’ve tried. Maybe someone’s tried to quit smoking. Or has tried a weight loss plan, you know. Intellectually, we might know exactly what to write down to achieve it. Is Anxiety Impeding You?
But to actually make that happen. Sometimes we need a little help. And that’s where experts can come in. So we were never experts on the individuals living with mental illness. We were experts on how to help people achieve quality of life. That’s going to be productive and and appreciated. But by the individuals. So that’s an interesting twist came in my career. When a asset management company came and said, we would like you to talk with us. I started to do some public speaking. That I was Teaching as well at the time and going to conferences, and they said, We’d like you to talk to talk to her advisors a little bit about mental health and mental illness.
And I thought, okay, I can give them a mental health mental illness one on one. But then they really pushed me and they said, No, no, we want the skills. We don’t just want the awareness, we want the skills that we can use. And I thought, Well, what do I know about financial advisors? Well, it didn’t take long. After speaking with a couple of them. To realize that the same skill set that we’re using to try to help people stay on their own treatment plan. Is what financial advisors need us to help people stay on their own financial plan. As they experience not just the ups and downs of the markets. But also the ups and downs in their own mental health and what’s happening in their own lives.
So for example. You know, when you go to a financial planner. When something big has happened. You’ve maybe lost your job, or you’ve gotten big promotion. Or you’ve come into an inheritance. Which also means that you’ve lost someone that you love. So all these mental health skills. A lot of them are borrowed from a specific type of intervention. Called motivational interviewing. Apply directly to the professional sector. Is Anxiety Impeding You?
After starting to work with the financial planners, it quickly branched out into other groups that would come up. So I presented a conference for financial planners. And a lawyer would come up to me after the presentation and start talking to me about their challenges. So I really began to become quite passionate about trying to support professionals. To develop the mental health skills. Not just so that they can get better professional outcomes themselves. Meaning they can increase their bottom line. But also so. That people experiencing mental health challenges can get more equitable service from the experts they’re going to see.
Right. So one thing led to another. And eventually, that became so busy. That I had to leave the Canadian Mental Health Association. And I officially formed my own company. Quality Mental Health Interventions, Training and Consulting. Which is what we’ve been doing for the last few years.
Selling Relationships
Roy Barker 06:56 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Yeah, I think that it’s interesting. Interesting concept to take this to the, you know, like the salesman and with them. Having to not only call to, you know, try to get people to sign up. But also managing them and finances. One that, you know, it can be very, very emotional for the, for the investor. You know, with the ups and downs. And then, like you said, just the live life situations that come along.
So, you know, one thing I was going to ask is, and I guess part of this is giving them the tools, when not only for their own mental health but maybe to understand the what the other party is going through as well to be able to, Is Anxiety Impeding You,well, sometimes when we understand we can choose the right words versus like, Hey, I just don’t know what’s going on with this person.
Adam 07:48
Absolutely. And one of the things that we focus on and again. Which comes from working directly with people living with mental illness. And maybe I should just just for your audience just quickly mentioned. The difference between mental health and mental illness. Okay. So mental illness is a specific diagnosis, it affects about 20% of the population. It’s things like depression, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, anxiety disorders. Mental health is what we all have 100% of people. Just like we all have physical health. And some days is positive, and some days is not positive. Mental health is the same.
Somebody with a mental illness that might have that’s gonna, that could affect their mental health, right. So because they’re hearing voices. Which are putting them down and saying horrible things and telling them to hurt themselves. They might experience a negative mental health. Is Anxiety Impeding You? But they can also have a mental illness and experience positive mental health. That’s the goal when it comes to somebody living with a mental illness. But the mistake that society’s made for a long time, and I feel like COVID. It’s kind of sped up the process of people understanding. Is that having a mental illness? Does not mean you’re the only one with mental health?
Everybody has mental health. So some mental health issues, you have to manage your entire life, just like some physical health issues. Diabetes is a good competitor. Where diabetes can be managed. You might have to take medication to help with it. You might have to make a couple lifestyle changes. But you can live a long and productive life with diabetes. The same as you can, as you take care of your own mental health. And if you did have a mental illness that you were kind of managing at the same time.
So it’s important to recognize that when we do talk about supporting professionals to develop their mental health skills, we’re not talking about just serving that 20% of the population. We’re talking about 100% of the population and just like you’ve mentioned, that includes themselves, so their relationship with themselves is an important part of that. Yeah, and
Roy Barker 09:39 Is Anxiety Impeding You
I guess to take that further, I think what I’m hearing you say is so, just like myself, I can have poor mental health episodically today because of events that are happening, doesn’t necessarily mean I have a mental illness. And conversely, if you have a diagnosis as mental illness, you can still have good mental health days. If You have the tools in which the navigate your illness?
Absolutely. That’s exactly. Yeah. And yes, I’m sure this, actually, you know, it has a lot to do with our, with our peers. Our work, I’m sure that even management would be managers would be very well served to learn some of these techniques. And I guess most of it starts with listening, is that correct? Listening and observing behavior?
Adam 10:28
Absolutely. So much of it is around, you know, listening, and really hearing what a person means not just jumping on. You know, they might say, you know, the classic is How are you doing, I’m fine. And find means 10,000 different things, right. And if you’re married, it means 100,000 different things. So, so this idea of really listening to learn about a person and to get a bit more knowledge around their experience is so important.
I was listening to your, the podcast you did with David brecker, just prior to us talking. And he talked about this innate desire to be listened to, and it’s so true, there’s nothing more frustrating than when you want to communicate something you’re not able to. And if you’re not able to, because the other person isn’t listening, because they just want to sell you something or whatever it might be, that’s gonna set up a really negative relationship.
Whereas people who master this, while still maintaining their boundaries, we’re not talking about professionals becoming therapists, we’re just talking about them using mental health skills to achieve what I call the golden thread their professional goals, which are in line with the customer’s professional goals, the techniques I teach, and the things that I work with. It’s not meant for the, you know, quote, unquote, used car salesman trying to sell you a lemon.
It’s meant for the people like lawyers, financial advisors, realtors, human resource professionals, people who are trying to help people achieve what’s in their own best interest. So you’re both lined up with theirs.
Emotionally Charged Interactions
Roy Barker 11:59 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Yeah. Yeah, cuz most of those situations are all very typically emotionally charged. interactions, I’m assuming anyway, absolutely. You have to talk to the lawyer, or the HR department, oh, even if you’re, even if it’s a good thing, even if you’re interviewing for a job, there can be a lot of stress and anxiety that goes along with that
Adam 12:23
100%. And there’s things that you can do to help lower your stress and anxiety before things like job interviews, or stressful interactions with the HR department or something along those lines. But yeah, it’s all about how can we have an underlying theme of the mental health professional relationships course, which is sort of my my flagship online course, is the idea that anxiety is the enemy of professional relationships, the more you can help to reduce the client’s anxiety, your own anxiety, your supervisor, if you have one your colleagues if you have, the more productive you can be and productive is different than positive.
Because Roy, you mentioned a whole bunch of very stressful conversations a person might have, those might not feel comfortable. But they might be very productive if you’ve got the skills to to make that happen. And that’s the ultimate goal. I don’t have a secret to make life always feel good and happy. And you know, sometimes we see these memes on the internet, and they can actually be harmful to our mental health. Because they make it sound like it’s so easy to be happy, you just have to look for the positive. But that can actually be damaging, because like toxic positivity is a thing to where we want you to experience the uncomfortable and to experience the, you know, the whole range of emotions that makes us human, but then to have productive actions come out of that.
Roy Barker 13:43 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Yeah, and that’s interesting. Because I think that’s my opinion, I’ll ask you as this as a question is, you know, a lot of times these uncomfortable, conversations become toxic, because we get off track and we forget about what we’re talking about. And then we either, you know, make it personal or about something else. And I you know, I just use spouses. Typically they’re the easy ones to take, take your stressors out on so, you know, somebody says, Well, you know, could you pick your shoes up by the front door and move those out of the way?
And then all of a sudden, it’s like, Yeah, well, you didn’t clean up the dishes quick. And you know, we kind of jump off of that topics. I imagine some of that skills is remaining on topic, remaining civil, not getting, you know, enraged and then also not getting personal. So I’ll let you address that let you address those.
Adam 14:39
No 100%. And actually, yeah, like you said that very well. So the idea is to put space between our reaction so we have a reaction, it’s instant. It happens. We don’t want to judge it. We don’t want to beat ourselves up for it. It’s important that we’re not getting stuck in there. But in a professional setting, we really have to make sure there’s space between Our reaction and our response. So our reactions, what happens inside, it could be, you know, I remember having a conversation as a manager, and the person was talking in a way that made them seem like my judgmental mind was saying this person seems really entitled, like, they seem to be really like not getting the fact that this is their job, and they’re supposed to be working and all this stuff. And that was my reaction.
And my response based on that reaction would be to potentially attack them on that sense of entitlement, which would not be helpful at all. So I couldn’t control that I had that feeling. And do I want to be judgmental? No, but I didn’t beat myself up for feeling that you put some space in there to think and then the response is, you know, what, I’m curious, what is it that you really want to get out of this job, so I could get a better understanding from the individual about what it is that they want it because what I was judging as entitlement was really them doing me a favor, which is sharing information, because more information is always better, and that they weren’t getting everything they wanted out of the job.
If I want somebody to be happy and successful, especially in such important work as community mental health work with a really vulnerable population, then I want them to feel positive and good. We ended up having a fantastic working relationship. And it really changed how they approach their their client base, which if you, if you take that and you move it over into something like financial planning, or realtors or whatever, you know, that’s going to affect the bottom line, you know, you’re going to increase sales, increase customer loyalty, get multi generational clients, right?
Because you’re, you’re really engaging with them, as opposed to judging and then just getting these power struggles and these immediate reactions, or even jumping right into what you can do for them, as they look that has nothing to do with me, all I can do is buy and sell your house. So let’s get back to it. Right. So that you can build those relationships. And hopefully, again, as I said, it’s always going to be comfortable, but it was productive. Yeah.
Reaction vs. Repsonse
Roy Barker 16:58 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Now that you mentioned that, that was something that struck me that the very first time that we talked was the, you know, really putting that separation between the reaction and the response. I mean, you know, we can feel taken aback with our reaction, but not trying to, you know, not taking the count of three or whatever, before we actually have a response instead of being in a heated situation. And I it’s funny, because I just posted a meme not long ago about things that you can’t take back. And that’s one of those is the words that come out of your mouth, we can never get those back. Right.
Adam 17:32
And the other thing I would suggest is, you know, it’s kind of like there’s this expression, Time heals all wounds. Not really, um, time that’s used effectively heals all wounds, right? It might mean counseling is involved, it might mean just self improvement is involved self awareness, spending some time with your emotions, whatever it might be, but just time doesn’t really tend to do that much for us. So the same thing with putting time between our reaction and our response. It’s how do we use that time?
So that’s where we can run some filters. That’s where we can say things like, Am I making a judgment? Right? And if so, how can I change the outcome? I reword this? You know, is this am I being attacked? Because usually the answer is no. Right? It’s not that I even if the person seems like they’re attacking you, it’s probably because you’re part of a larger system that’s involved, maybe they’re angry at the company that you work with, maybe they had bad interactions with five other people who held your position, it’s usually not actually a personal attack.
And then you might, and then also confronting our biases, right, and our things which are, because different people come across, in in different ways based on their background, but also based on your background, that’s all going to influence how we how we interact with each other. Is Anxiety Impeding You? And that’s where the value of things like diversity training, and cultural competency and all that sort of stuff, really does blend in not just with, you know, the idea that we want to live in a more, you know, loving and fair world.
But also ultimately, with improving the bottom line, the more people you can relate to and connect with in a positive productive way, the larger your customer basis. So that’s why that stuff becomes so important. Yeah.
Roy Barker 19:09 Is Anxiety Impeding You
You mentioned earlier the core, well, that the mental health struggles are mental illness struggles and drugs. Is there studies out there that kind of show which one of those come first do is the people have mental illness that lead to drug use? Or is the drug use lead to some mental illnesses?
Adam 19:29
So the answer is yes. Okay. And that’s a that’s a fantastic and very insightful question. Yeah. Um, the truth is, is I say yes, because it can be both. So very often, for example, if you look at rates of men with depression 50 years ago, almost non existent. all you had was a bunch of alcoholics. Well, what were these alcoholics doing people living with alcohol addiction. They were self medicating their depression. Right. So there’s certainly is that there also with some of the opiates and drugs on the market right now?
Absolutely, they can cause organic issues with the brain. People can develop long term mental health issues based on using substances. Then, so you have this kind of double full one is people maybe who are trying to self medicate and have a mental illness, so the illness came first. And then you can also develop certain mental health issues based on drug use. We are like, anecdotally, from speaking with community workers, we’re seeing more and more of people who are seem to have an addiction issue first and a mental illness.
Second, even to the point where some people were thought to have a mental illness, when they’re able to get away from the opiates and clean. They sometimes they don’t actually have a mental illness, and they’re able to get into just functioning. You know, they may always consider themselves someone with addiction issues. And they might always need counseling and things on that, because addiction issues on their own are now considered a mental illness. And that can certainly exist concurrently with other illnesses. So it’s a very, it’s a, it’s a tough question to answer. Absolutely, though, drugs impact people’s mental health, and some people do have long term very serious consequences of
Self-Medication
Roy Barker 21:23 Is Anxiety Impeding You
So and I don’t want to, you know, kind of go down that rabbit hole too far. But one more question is that, so sometimes we self-medicate with, you know, alcohol, drugs, whatever. But if we weren’t self-medicating could we maybe implored tools that would help us with our mental health. Whereas if we’re self-medicating, we’re not able to use those tools.
Adam 21:50
So the mental mental health treatment has really taken a very progressive approach, which has proven to be very effective. So I should also mention, so in my background, I’m also a project manager, I also do something called Six Sigma, which is process improvement through data management. I’m an outcomes guy, I’m not a Kumbaya, this feels good. So let’s do it kind of person, I want to see if I’m doing something I want it to work, right. So like when working as a community mental health worker, if I went to someone’s house, and all I did was sit and have a coffee with them, and chat, that might feel good.
And I might feel like I’ve done a lot. And sometimes that that means more than you think. But if that’s all that I’m doing, if that’s all I’m bringing to the table, that’s kind of that feel good idea, what I want to do is bring in some of those tools from cognitive behavioral therapy, dialectical behavioral therapy help the person really to move in the direction that they want. So no matter where someone is out on the mental health spectrum, from very ill to absolutely healthy, there’s always interventions that we can assist with and things that they can do.
So even someone who’s very actively a addicted to opiates, and living with a serious mental illness, there’s things they can do to improve their mental health. And it’s incremental. And the hope is that they get to the point where they say there’s some ambivalence, some ambivalence in terms of saying, you know, what, I do drugs, because I like how they make me feel for, you know, an hour, I don’t have any problems, and I’m living in poverty, and I’m living with all this mental, you know, that centers of my mental illness and all this.
But I wonder if I had a bit more money to go out for, you know, coffees, with my friends, I wonder if life would be a little bit better. And that’s where we can jump in and say, interesting, tell me more about how life could be better if you had more money to spend, and time with your friends. So it’s not quitting the drugs necessarily. That’s the first part of the intervention. It’s increasing their social life, and then that one kind of feeds off together. Okay, interesting. So you don’t have to wait to be well, like, just like, if you had a broken leg, you don’t have to wait for it to heal to start treating it. Right. You got to start treating it in order to heal. Exactly. Okay.
Reopening
Roy Barker 23:55 Is Anxiety Impeding You
So, you know, this is, I guess, after we come through COVID, you know, what are some? What are some observations that you’ve had over this last year? And then I feel like we’re going through a critical state of reopening, people are getting back. I don’t know, it’s been such a divisive time for a lot of reasons. Is Anxiety Impeding You? But you know, I guess just what are your thoughts on you know, what you’ve seen over the last year versus, you know, what’s, what’s coming up for us?
Adam 24:27
Well, there’s things that I’ve seen and then there’s also studies Luckily, they’ve, they’ve done a lot of work on on kind of where people are at, they’ve definitely seen a huge spike in terms of people identifying as having mental health challenges, and experiencing mental health crises. I know, a company called bridgehouse Asset Management did did some research with a company called navigator.
And they found that 92% of financial planners identify that they work with clients who are having mental health child who have made bad decisions based on their mental So it’s a it’s definitely affecting everyone, what I’m seeing anecdotally Now, in addition to, you know, and also there was things around increases in domestic violence, and that’s often can be due to stress, increasing self harm activities, children experiencing major increases in terms of their anxiety and mental health challenges that they’re having.
So we’re definitely seeing that. And anecdotally, what I’m seeing now is a lot of anxiety around what’s going back to work gonna look like, you know, is it? Is it going to be, you know, us all working out of our cubicles in the same way is it going to be a 5050 kind of thing, I heard a great phrase called COVID keepers, which are, you know, we got a lot, there’s a lot of good stuff that happened during this pandemic, people got more family time, people spend more time with their pets and animals, which actually has a great impact on people’s mental health. So some anxiety around losing some of those things that we might think of as positive.
And as well of how do Is there a way for me to keep both and progressive employers and employers who want to hang on to people are definitely going to have to have those conversations with their employees, because people have been working from home for a year and a half. Now, a lot of them are keen to sit in two hours of morning traffic every day to get to the office to go up and do what they can do from their home office. Yeah, so. So some anxiety around that. And it should be interesting to see.
But I think a lot of a lot of hope people are ready for life to get a little bit more back to normal and to engage. And people who initially thought working from home is awesome. I never have to go into the office, I could work in my pajamas. And isn’t that after a year and a half, they’re expressing loneliness. And most most people seem to want to blend Yeah, certain amount of days in an office, and then a certain amount of days at home to allow that flexibility.
Roy Barker 27:01 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Yeah, and, you know, we’ve shown that it can be done in a lot of instances, and I just actually published a piece this morning on my personal website about this, that, you know, because what I keep hearing is a lot of, you know, like a big brush for the door that, you know, people have been talking about that we’ve become used to working from home, and those that want to stay at home are saying, Look, I’m not going back, I’ll just go find another job.
Yeah, the market has been good enough. You know, people are short handed everywhere. They’ve had that that option. But I think, kind of going along with this lines of, you know, I think it’s good to ask the question, because you’re right, I think there are a couple there about three camps of people, there’s people like me that I like being at home, I get more done, not interruptions, I get enough socialization, you know, on zoom meetings and talking with family. But there are some people that really, it’s hard for them to function without that social interaction.
And then, you know, working in groups, you get some synergies, things like that. And then, like you said, there those people there be like, I’d like to go in for a day or two, but spend the other, you know, two or three days at home. So, as an employer, I just feel like, you know, we really have to ask this question, and it’s part of getting to know our people. And because I think you, I’m assuming that, you know, we can have some core reactions, you know, based on exactly what you want, and what you’re mandated to do.
Adam 28:29
And you actually, you hit the nail on the head, again, their ROI, which is you got to ask, because the days of, you know, worker number 27643 coming in and punching a ticket and all this stuff. Sure, they still may be environments that that are that work that way. But for a large part, it’s time my if I was to give employers one piece of mail, let me give him two pieces of advice. The first would be implement the psychological health and safety standards. Canada has a national standard that’s optional right now.
But it is a world leading standard based on other countries which have developed the same, but that puts in place that makes sure that the environment is not causing psychological harm. And the second piece of advice would be Get to know your staff. Get to know them really well, get to know who is rushing to pick up and drop off their kids get to know who really loves the break of leaving the home life.
Where it’s very chaotic and coming into the office, you know, get to know who who he who enjoys, like team building events and things of that nature, and who are the people that are really afraid of it and you can start to put together teams that really represent people from every angle, because that’s going to help you to better serve the clients because I can guarantee you the clients are coming from every angle as well.
So like if you take me for example, I love that I can meet with my doctor over with similar to zoom, we have something called the Ontario telehealth network, but it’s similar to zoom was just a little more secure. That’s amazing. Why on earth do I want to sit in a unless I need something physical like checked? It’s great. Whereas for other people, they don’t trust it.
And they’re worried that you know that they’re not able to communicate effectively. And it’s also important that we recognize like, as a man, when I was managing with the Canadian Mental Health Association, if I some stuff I didn’t see very often at all, because they were out in the community all the time. So I could have a quick chat on the phone. Anyone can sound happy, and content for 20 minutes.
Yeah, right. Even often, some of the most depressed people can still pull that off. And if they can’t pull it off on a zoom, they can definitely do it in the text. So it is different than seeing people seven hours a day when you can really see who’s dragging who’s not dragging, who might need a little bit more support that day. So getting in touch with that really getting to know those those staff is is going to be crucial for retention.
Roy Barker 30:51 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Yeah, yeah, definitely. And the other part of I like what you say about getting to know your employees, because it was something, you know, when I had a lot of people working for me, I took that time to know, I knew them, I knew their families and knew their wives, their kids, we had, you know, outside functions outside the workplace, because it gave me a good indication, because I had people that, you know, they were just grumpy. I mean, they were grumpy. And that was who they were, versus people who, you know, tended not to be as grumpy.
But you can tell when there was a change in their demeanor, and be able to go out and say, Hey, what’s up because, and not in a threatening way, but like, I’m here to help. Because what we have to, I think what we have to understand is whatever’s happening at home, it comes to the workplace, and whatever happens in the workplace goes home, not many people that I know are able just to check it out the door and say, You know what, I had a really terrible day at work, but I’m not going home and you know, slam the door, do whatever, do whatever people do.
Adam 31:55
Yeah, and there are techniques to help with that. There are things that you can do mindfulness exercises, and things that you could do in your car before you go into your home. I was talking, I’m part of a really cool group that a friend of mine, David Cohen put together, it’s called a mastermind group. And we sort of read different books and support each other and, you know, come up with different ideas. But one of the ones that one of the participants shared was, you know, a lot of people do mantras in the morning, they’ll say, like this, you know, visit my goals for the day, and I’m going to accomplish them in that, but the idea of doing it twice a day, once you move forward, and then once before going into your house.
So before we’re you know, I’m you know, my mantra might be connected to, I’m going to be productive today, I’m going to get everything on my to do list on, and I’m going to make two phone calls to people to try to work on to do some networking, right. And then before going back into the house, saying, I am going to be an amazing partner, I’m going to be an amazing Dad, you know, these are the things I want to accomplish, I’m going to have a one to one conversation with each my kids, I’ve got four kids so that, you know, you got to book the time. And, you know, and that idea of a second manager for to, to help to put some separation between the two.
So at work, it helps you to leave the home life a little bit, even though we acknowledge you never completely Leave it. And when you’re coming home, you leave the work life a little bit even acknowledging that, as you said, you can never totally, but one of the really negative things that’s come out of the working from home, is for people who haven’t been able to set boundaries, maybe they haven’t been taught or they never thought about it, then come come across, instead of working from home, they’re living at work.
So their work is constantly around them. And you know, they’ve got all their computers stuff set up in their bedrooms. So as they’re going to sleep, you know, they’re seeing that there’s emails coming in on their computer and all this kind of stuff. And that can be really detrimental to a person’s mental health.
Roy Barker 33:53 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Yeah, and I have to, I’ll check the box on that one. And, you know, it’s even more complicated for myself because I always enjoy what I do. And so, it’s not like a drudgery, like, I gotta go do this. I mean, there’s always some sense of excitement, and, you know, getting things done and being productive. And is, it is a difficult thing to turn that off. We, we’ve just had to regroup, you know, around my house and say, Okay, here’s our definite, hard stop no more, because, you know, I have to admit, the last three or four months, I’ve gotten a little bit out of hand about, you know, being up all hours of the day and night and like you said, you know, phone’s going off in the middle of the night because I deal with people all over the world.
So it’s always so wait, somebody is always open, and you know, during my 24 hour period, so it’s it’s and it’s not only just for me, I’m sure it’ll really improve my health because I’ve got to start you know, getting back out and walking, doing you know, eat and eat and you know, kind of getting back to the schedule, but also helps the family lives because that’s another thing you know, Happy Happy wife. Happy A lot of things to consider.
Adam 35:05
Yeah, definitely the goal is to have a home that’s full of contentment and happiness no matter what the family unit might look like, exactly,
Roy Barker 35:14 Is Anxiety Impeding You
yeah. And, you know, I think the awareness between situational has, because this is where I was kind of trying to think about this while ago, talking about, you know, really getting to know your people, you know, that situational? Then, you know, I guess the people that maybe are having some more chronic, long or acute, that were the chronic issues, more long term issues.
And I think that companies have become very well about providing services for employees. But number one, I don’t think that information has been disseminated enough to let everybody know, but, you know, I have to think that there’s also still a stigma, like, if I have to go tell my boss, and I’m struggling, you know, is he gonna be like, yeah, that, that guy’s on his way out, we’re gonna go ahead and start, you know, looking for somebody new. Even though it’s probably, you know, it’s illegal to do that, I’m sure. But it’s still people are scared about it. So people are scared to raise their hands and say, you know, what, I need help. And I don’t know, I guess that’s probably the biggest message that we could hope to deliver from this, this talk is that don’t be afraid to reach out for help.
Adam 36:28
Yeah, and I mean, that’s part of like, when I talk about the psychological health and safety standard, you don’t need a standard to say that I want my workplace to be psychologically healthy and safe, right? Basically, I it means less time off, it means less, or not less time off. But less sick time off from staff means less presenteeism, which is one of the most rampant things right now taking money out of businesses, bottom lines, is people coming to work, but who just mentally aren’t able to, and who if they did take a day off, maybe they could take the time to catch their breath, and to re you know, kind of reset their compass. Often it takes more than a day, and it takes a series of things, but at least to get moving on it.
So do you have a place where someone can say, I really need a mental health day today. And the other thing is around employee assistance programs, which most companies now offer? There was some interesting work done around that where, you know, the question was raised, so if we were a great company, because our staff don’t use the EAP service, the employee assistance program a lot, right? Well, that doesn’t mean that you’re safe.
A great company, most likely, what that means is either it’s an inadequate service, which isn’t I mean, it’s it is insurance companies running, you know, offering counseling and things like that, or it is that staff don’t trust it, they don’t trust the organization. So they don’t believe that it’s anonymous. And that if they call in, because at the end of the day, those EAP services usually offer, or it could also be that staff are unaware of the service and what they can use it for, because most of them offer things from budgeting to like people going through divorce and through everything.
So if your company has very low EAP use, then it means that your staff are these magical staff who don’t experience loss who don’t experience divorce, who never had financial issues, because those are all unworked related things that EAP service can help with. And if they’re not going for that stuff, they’re probably not going for the feelings of burnout, that they’re getting at work.
And some of those other challenges they’re experiencing, or even if they’re having a challenge with a colleague, that’s something you can potentially go to your EAP about and get some direction around. Now you know, how you can, how you can work through it in a in a, you know, I use the word psychologically safe, but we’re really talking about is trying to remove as many things that cause psychological harm in the workplace, right, and trying to put things in place that promote psychological health and having an open a open communication between management and staff. That’s not based on trying to assign blame. It’s based on trying to solve problems. You know, that’s a major part.
Roy Barker 39:04 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Yeah. Yeah, that’s a huge aspect. You know, even with all different aspects of our businesses, you know, a lot of times we spend so much trying to time trying to figure out who to blame that we’re not really focused on finding a solution. And one thing I’ll add to the EAP issue is taking care of aging parents, you know, back in the 60s and 70s. Is Anxiety Impeding You? The issues were, you know, around child care, child birth, things like that. And now we’ve progressed that, you know, a lot of people my age are having to spend more and more time taking care of their parents and loved one. And, you know, it’s, it becomes a real stressor for people as well. Absolutely. And
Adam 39:45
let me give an example with that one specifically of an accommodation that that I did with a staff member who didn’t come to me I went to them, and I could just tell and again, because they were an all star mentioned that you love your work those things. logistic is at risk. In fact, you can make a case that they can be even more at risk of burnout. Because they’re burning the candle at both ends. I know I went through a period where I was way overextended. You know, I’m sitting there doing these trainings with companies, and I’m working on the PowerPoint, and I’m like, I had a broken leg at the time.
It’s three in the morning, and I’m writing about how important sleep is to your, you know, to your health. And, you know, you do run into these cases of the, you know, the cobblers kids have no shoes. But it No one’s immune to it right now. Like it affects everybody. So yeah, we definitely want to make sure that we’re taking care of ourselves so that we can be a president effective.
Roy Barker 40:40 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Yeah, and you know, we, it’s a professional has, we had to be careful what we write because I’ve had my partner Terry, she’s like, are you actually reading what you’re writing here? Because you could probably apply that to your life.
Adam 40:52
I’m not gonna say that my partner has ever said that to me, and arguments or anything, but certainly none of us are perfect all the time. Yeah. So having your own words thrown in your face anxiety? about listening? Yeah, making sure you understand the other person first. And exactly.
Simple Tips
Roy Barker 41:11 Is Anxiety Impeding You
So what are some tips that you would give I know, there’s, it’s a wide category, you know, we’ve talked about like, maybe that the financial person in that sales role, or the real estate person or lawyer, and then we’ve also talked kind of about managing individuals in the workplace. But you know, what are some tips that you could just throw out there that could help help everybody some, in terms of things they could do for themselves, yeah, themselves, or even relating to others better.
Adam 41:41
So, um, when it comes to things that people can do for themselves, mindfulness is an evidence based, very useful set of body of knowledge, it can be all kinds of different aspects, one that I use a lot is box breathing, which I’ll just explain, because it’s been so so simple, I actually did it just before we started our conversation, it’s a way that I like to get myself into either peak performance, or sometimes just to transition from one activity to another.
And what I like about box breathing, especially when I’m training companies, because some of the companies I work in, they have quite a, you know, a high energy staff, maybe they’re working in, you know, where they’re pushing stocks and bonds and that kind of stuff. And the energy is different than in the nonprofit sector. Right. And it’s kind of like a hurrah, let’s go, let’s go and that.
So I like box breathing, because it like people who do yoga are familiar with it. But it’s also used by navy seals in the States by SWAT teams by police. It’s, it’s just very effective, right, and I’m talking about right before they breach a building. So if you’re, if you’re so tough, that mindfulness isn’t for you, because you’re you know, you this tough person and everything, you have to be tougher than a navy seal, if you’re going to tell me that this breathing exercise can help you, right.
Is Anxiety Impeding You? So it’s basically just picture building a box in your in your mind, you breathe in, it’s all the breathing zone through your nose in and out, you breathe in for four counts, you hold it for four count. And as you’re breathing, you’re kind of tracing this box in your head. So you breathe in for four count, hold for four count, breathe out for four count, hold for four count.
And you just keep doing that in a cycle for a few minutes. And it really helps to drop the anxiety and to get your breathing in line. It helps with like your parasympathetic response, and all these sorts of things. That you can be clear and focused on what you’re doing, you don’t want to end up in a panic, right? So it can be very, very useful that way. So that’s, that’s one technique that people can use.
The one that nobody likes, is diet, and exercise is very effective at helping everybody in terms of how they’re able to manage stress. Yeah, um, probably the most useful one is just reach out, reach out to the people around you, I guarantee you’re not the only one struggling. If you reach out to someone, and you don’t get a productive response, don’t let that stop you from reaching out to somebody else. You know, there was one I did a I presented with someone from the Canadian Medical Association.
They presented this amazing slide, they said, if you want to see what stigma looks like, look at this slide. And it said, How many doctors would support a colleague who came to them with a mental health challenge, and you see this bar on the bar graph up at like 95%. Then it said, How many doctors would go to a colleague with a mental health challenge? Is Anxiety Impeding You? And it was like 20%. And that’s exactly what stigma looks like this fear of, and it’s not that stigma is not real. You could go to your employer and your employer absolutely could you know if they’re not progressive or knowledgeable on mental health issues, could do something that goes against your human rights, your your your rights in the workforce, and sometimes you do have to go that route.
But what we want to do is obviously reduce reduce that stigma, but that idea that so many people are willing to help. And so few people are willing to ask for it is a real paradox in our society. And hopefully, we’re moving towards more and more people saying, you know what I am, I am going to talk about this. But when it comes to self disclosure, you know, you do have to gauge Dude, you know, do you that’s why trust is so important. You know, and also, again, going back to that idea of anxiety is the enemy of professional relationships, if you’re a manager, your staffs anxiety is a problem, you want to get that down as low as possible, so that you can have a productive relationship, and then they’re more likely to come to you with a challenge.
So around that, that idea of the, you know, the sandwich generation of people taking care of kids and parents. So I have the staff member who’s great, but I could tell was exhausted and it was we, you know, didn’t seem to be caring as much about the work. Is Anxiety Impeding You? So I could make a judgment and say, Oh, they don’t care about the work anymore. They’re jaded, it’s time to get rid of them, or at least write them off as an effective staff member, whatever, I had the conversation with them, they had an elderly parent. Is Anxiety Impeding You? And they said, We got, you know, we got an hour for lunch.
And I appreciate that it’s flexible, and I can take it when I want. But it takes me 20 minutes to drive back to my house where I like to, I have to check in on my parent, or you have to check in on my father, I have 20 minutes. And then I got to race back here. And I’m not even getting Time to eat anything and all this. So we said we looked at the requirements of the position and said, Well, why don’t you take a two hour lunch and work an hour later? Right? And they said, Oh, that would be that would really help. You know, on some days, except there are days that I’ve got to pick up my kids and I can’t work an hour later.
And I said, Okay, well come back to me with some ideas, right. And they came back with a schedule, they got everything done. They put in the same hours as everybody else. And a complete 180 back to being an all star on the team. Yeah. And they went actually on to a leadership position. So yeah, it’s communication and trust can be very powerful. But it’s got to be earned on both parties.
Is Anxiety Impeding You
Roy Barker 46:57 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Right? Yeah. And that flexibility, because it’s funny, you mentioned that paper that, you know, that I just published today mentioned that about it, I know we have deadlines, and we have meetings, there are certain things that happen a certain time that we just have to be present for. But if you’re writing a report, or if you’re doing some analysis, typically, you know, if you’re in the early or middle stages of a project, does it really matter if you do that at 10, in the morning, or at eight at night, you know, whatever, whenever you can be productive.
If you you know, have like that taken that the extra time for lunch to be in a good mindset. The other thing I think it does, or it’s done for me is I feel gratitude to my employer. Yes, I want to make sure I give enough back that you can see that. I do appreciate, recognize and appreciate what you’re doing for me. So I don’t mind giving a little bit extra important to remember
Adam 47:52
that. If you look at loyalty to employers, it’s probably at an all time, low and high right now, depending on how well your company navigated the COVID experience, because I think that it did remind people because we you know, millennials and, and, and younger, you know, some of the gen Z’s and stuff like that, statistically, I’m not stereotyping statistically, they job hop a lot more than like, you know, boomers is doing and even, you know, you could argue that Generation X is sort of the last group who really thinks in terms of, I’m going to have a 30 year career at this company, right, a lot of people are doing gig work and moving back and forth, and all this kind of stuff.
So to build that loyalty does mean that you’re going to reduce your, you’re going to improve your retention rates. And any study that you look at retention is the is definitely a goal, a piece of gold that you want to you want to be able to mind. Because every time you bring in a new staff, it’s not just bringing in new staff, it means that you’re adding to the existing staff, a training world. Is Anxiety Impeding You? So they also start to get more burnt out and you can end up in these vicious circles.
Again, we mentioned nurses before, nurses get burnt out, like the the amount of people are sort of like, okay, you this group can do this, and this group can do that. And nurses, well, you guys just have to figure out a way to do it, right, whether it’s COVID, whether it’s anything, it’s like find a way and get it done. So nurses would burn out, they end up on stress leave, which means you’re now you’ve got a lowered Lord number of nurses. Well, then they get burnt out because they’re doing the work of an extra person. And you’ve brought in a new nurse who has to be trained, so they’re also trying to train and then you lose another nurse to it.
By the end of it. You have nurses who’ve only worked there for six or seven months training the new ones coming in because everyone’s either leaving her on leave, and it really becomes quite detrimental. If you translate that to a for profit company. You can see how that would really you know, you’re just say what you end up with is dirty water. And what I mean by that is if you take a clean fish and you put it into dirty water, you don’t end up with clean water you end up with Dirty fish, you’ve got to clean the water. Yeah. And that’s that environment of how we support each other and sort of what the lines of communication look like.
Roy Barker 50:08 Is Anxiety Impeding You
And if that goes on long enough, I think also what you see is a breakdown in processes and procedures, because nobody was here to really train me correctly. And now I’m training you, and I’ve got maybe half the story, you know, and it just as we do this consistently over the long term, it gets to where, you know, we have zero knowledge transfer, and people aren’t doing what they need to do in the job itself.
Adam 50:35
100% and ultimately, how management then deals with that says a lot about the emotional intelligence and the the expertise of the management, because if they just start blasting people for making mistakes with procedures that they were never properly shown, you’re gonna lose good employees, right, and you know, who sticks around the worst ones, the ones who are just phoning it in, who don’t want to go anywhere, and all that, but you know, what, even they can be engaged and, and, and fired up and active.
Because at the end of the day, people want to contribute, people want to be passionate, no matter what the work is, you know, finding that Zen that just love of doing the tasks, no matter if it’s a mundane task, or a complex task. and engaging all those people is just about finding out what their Why is, you know, why do they come to work? What is it that they get out of it? Is Anxiety Impeding You? You know, why? What gets what gets them excited, and then putting in the house.
So how can we shape your position, so that you’re doing more of the things that you love, which is going to help us doing less of the things you don’t love, like documentation, and, you know, data entry, and all that kind of stuff, and let’s get creative. And when you have a workforce that’s, that’s engaged, they drive, you don’t need to pull them, right, they push towards it.
Cost of Employee Turnover
Roy Barker 51:47 Is Anxiety Impeding You
I don’t think a lot of companies realize the actual true dollar outlay for turning over employees, you know, some of the lower level employees, it can cost, you know, five $6,000, to turn them over. And as you start working up to professional C suite people, it gets astronomical, but it’s not a line item on an income statement. So, I think a lot of times people just disregard it, but they don’t understand the true impact. dollar was and then also, you know, as we bring people in, if they’re toxic, they, they can poison the pool as well, kind of, like you said, the dirty water. So, you know, one of my sayings is always, you know, be an employer of choice, don’t be an employer of last resort, because right, then get you in trouble.
Adam 52:36
All right, and also, how do you put a price on losing an individual who is starting in the mailroom, and who 15 years from now was going to be one of your maybe C suite people with all this great experience, you’ve been led by great managers who’s now been conditioned to have, you know, great instincts, and as well as having good knowledge of policies and procedures and how to do change management, because they’ve seen it. Right. But when they left after six months, because you know, it wasn’t there in the wind somewhere else.
Roy Barker 53:07 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Yeah, exactly. Adam, we appreciate you taking time out of your day, there’s so much to cover. I know, we probably didn’t even hit the tip of the iceberg. So I’m gonna give you an invite to you know, please come back and join us. And we can delve off more into this. I think it’s so important. I think it’s a pivotal time because of, you know, just honestly, when, when the COVID started, I thought we might see a lot of misbehavior, I don’t know how else to say it, you know, like criminal activity and fights and things like that.
But we did not think because people were home, we were separated. And then also there was that level extra level of support by governments to help with the unemployment. But now, it seems as all of this is going away, and we’re getting back to normal. I know, you know, around in where I live in the Dallas area, the road rage, the shootings, all of these violence has just really taken off over the last month or so. I mean, like to crazy levels that all these local police departments are having to come out to make, you know, statements to address it. It’s so bad. Yeah.
Adam 54:19
Yeah. And it’s, uh, you know, when we see a crisis, like, you know, when the world was running out of toilet paper, everyone was on the rest of buying toilet paper. We immediately think okay, the solution is, we got to get more toilet paper accessible to more people. Is Anxiety Impeding You? Well, right now we have a mental health crisis, because everyone’s gone through a traumatic experience, however, they experienced some people have good stuff happened. So not so good.
But everyone’s going through this weird like, you know, a lot of anxiety and, and that sort of peace. And right now what we need is mental health support. We need the government to maybe increase funding for counseling and things of that nature. Just because you can’t see it doesn’t make it any less real. That’s the crisis that we have right now. And it does, because governments aren’t really stepping up in this regard, it does come back to employers, but also to all of us to really develop those skills.
And that’s part of why some of the work I do is directly with companies. But a lot of the work that I do is directly with individuals, because there’s a lot that you can do, even if your workplace isn’t going to change. There’s a lot that you can do to take care of your own mental health to make you more effective. And to make a clear decision on, you know, maybe that’s not the workplace where you want to thrive. Right, but and then go find it.
Roy Barker 55:32 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Yeah, because it’s out there. And I think we could, we can even be better for those people around us, you know, we can recognize better when people need help, maybe we don’t have to make them ask us, but also removing that stigma, to be sure, ask for help, if you need it. And then also employers to be aware that, you know, there’s some fragile individuals out there right now that we need to really seek to understand what they’re going through what we could do to help them, it’s going to be an important time going forward, for sure.
Adam 56:05
And those are likely to be officers of the future, because like you said, it builds that loyalty. Yeah. Right. When somebody helps you out, you want to do you want to show that you appreciate it? And that that’s really how you build psychologically positive workspaces.
Roy Barker 56:19 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Four Sqare Breathing
Yeah, you know, the other thing I was gonna mention earlier, I forgot was the talking about the four-square breathing. But I’ve never really thought about that between events. So I’m going to try to do that, you know, as switch gears, because what I started doing in at night, well, I’ll do it in the morning. But then I added the evening one, just to kind of clear my mind for sleep. And it’s been very effective just to sit quietly, mindfully. And so I think that would help a lot with that anxiety of transitioning, you know, as we run through our day, just to take a minute to go through that exercise before we start that next task.
Adam 56:57
Yeah, especially like, if you’re driving to work, and you start getting all you know, wound up, because you know, you’ve got to confront somebody when you go in, and you’re afraid it’s gonna be, you know, someone who doesn’t take feedback well, or something like that. And so you’re really anxious, before you get out of your car, you just take two, three minutes, do some box breathing, and you approach everything differently. When I do live trainings, it’s commonly something that I’ll get everyone to do, right after the break.
And it really brings everyone back into the room and you know, it leaves, the phone calls that they had to make at the break and all that kind of stuff, it helps to transition out of that. And, yeah, it’s it’s very helpful when they did want to mention it. Actually, if you do that, I think it was 20 minutes a day, they actually say it changes how you breathe, in general eating. So you’re taking longer, deeper breaths, and you’re anxious, and you’ll experience lower anxiety as a baseline. Okay, so it’s pretty amazing. Yeah, cuz
Roy Barker 57:49 Is Anxiety Impeding You
I know, it’s something I’ve found out about myself is I’m usually a very shallow breather. And I think that’s something that we really need. I’ve been told, you know, to work on, taking those deep breaths, making sure we’re getting enough oxygen flowing around because it doesn’t even have to be a tense situation. But just more something, when you’re really when I’m really engaged, and really paying attention to what I’m doing, you know, you kind of forget that and you just, I’ll catch myself taking shallow breaths. So
Adam 58:19
you want to get in that flow, where everything’s where your body feels good, your brain feels good. You’re working, you’re working, you’re working. Then when it’s time to stop working, though, you know, you say, I’m really excited about this. And I can’t wait to get to it tomorrow, because I’m spending the rest of the night with my family. And that’s what I’m going to have.
Roy Barker 58:35 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Right, right. All right. So what is a habit? Now, we’ve talked about a few in this in here. But what is a habit that you just couldn’t do without in your daily life, either professionally, or personally, the one habit that I could not do without you.
Habit
Adam 58:58
I can tell you, I think that for me, it is honestly, just how I use that space between reactions and responses. I learned more about myself. In that time, too I see my own biases come out. And there are so many different types of, you know, conscious and unconscious bias, and we’re always kind of trying to work through and it’s changed how I interact with my children, how I interact with my partner, Kristen, it’s really, I would say that’s the biggest one is the idea of just not reacting all the time.
And like just taking that opportunity. Now in addition to that, certainly the days I exercise are a lot better than the days I don’t. The days that I’m eating, non-processed healthier foods are a lot better than the days that I don’t and I actually the other big one just in the last few years, is I finally got sleep with something I struggled with for a long time. And I finally got my sleep under control. So I do get a minimum of eight hours of sleep a night now. That’s really made a big difference. And that’s from having a sleep routine.
Roy Barker 1:00:04 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Yeah. And I think that’s important in that reactionary part. Because, to me, sleep is my trigger for everything, it’s for eating bad, it’s for not exercising, it’s for not drinking water, because now all of a sudden, I need coffee or soda pop to, you know, keep you on that, you know, keep your energy built up. And so that’s usually the start if I don’t get it. And so that’s been one of the things that, you know, as we’ve implemented, trying to cut things off at a certain time is making sure to get that rest very, very good.
Adam 1:00:34
What I think of it almost like a video game. So think of it think of it as though you have an anxiety meter, right. And just like in a video game, you know, you’ve got that big green line, and the more times they hit you, it goes red, red, red, red, red, and then you got a problem. I think of anxiety the same way. So I looked at my own anxiety, and I say, Hey, where is it at? What’s one thing I could do today that could bring it down? Because I know that’s gonna help my professional relationships.
And then when I’m interacting with someone, I think, well, what’s one thing I could do to bring their anxiety down, and I really picture it, like, almost like a meter in the course, I think there’s actually a slide where it looks that way. And you see, sort of an anxiety meter and how you can help to influence people to be more productive, which, whether it’s colleagues or whether it’s clients, or it’s yourself. What’s better than that, right, being more efficient with your time being getting the results that you want. Is Anxiety Impeding You? Some people think it’s slower, because you have to take that extra time in the beginning.
But it’s like any investment, you take the extra time in the beginning, and then things start going because you know, so it does that expression slow is smooth and smooth is fast. Right? They use that in the shooting sports a lot. When they talk about movement. I’ve done a little bit of work with the police and things like that. So I’ve adopted some of their their turn turns of phrase, but it’s 100% true, you take your time, in the beginning, you do it right, you get to know exactly what you’re doing, you find out exactly why someone is motivated to do what they do. And then you work on the how, and then you bring it forward, and things start start moving very differently.
So if the month is gonna pass, and you’re gonna make $10,000, but you did it with 100 different clients, and you didn’t really get to know any of them. And next month, you have to find a whole new set of 100 clients, but he lost most of them. Or you can make $15,000 with 50 clients, because you’re better able to meet their needs and get them to where they want and they want to stay with you and they want to work with you forever. Well, even though you spent more time with that 50 isn’t it more efficient? Isn’t it more productive? Right? And that’s, that’s the goal.
Wrap Up
Roy Barker 1:02:36 Is Anxiety Impeding You
Yeah. Yeah, definitely for sure. All right, how can people reach out and get a hold of you? Is Anxiety Impeding You? And also, is the is your training course available? Just to everybody? Or do you? Is it something you present in person?
Adam 1:02:52
So I do live training with usually organized by companies. So through, it’ll either be their HR department or sometimes it’s just different people within an organization, you might have seen me talk, I do a lot of talks on mental health in the financial advice relationship. However, to give an example, so my company was taking off, I had all these conferences booked. That’s when I said, Okay, I’m gonna leave, I can’t, but you know, I’ve had two jobs my whole life, I’m gonna go down to one job.
And, you know, this was in, you know, a couple years ago, and three months later, COVID hit, and all the conferences were canceled. And I said, Well, I kind of missed work, you know, having a pension and things of that nature. So I started thinking, Okay, I’ve got a pivot here. And luckily, everything picked up virtually. So now, like, it doesn’t feel quite the same. But I presented in Vancouver, I just do it from here from my office, which is in just east of Toronto. But so then I developed some online offering so that I could still reach out to people and they can get the information without having to sit in a group and without having to come in and and do it. And the nice thing is the feedback is people love that it’s self-paced.
So I have mental health for professional relationships is my largest course it only takes about seven hours to go through. It’s accredited by a couple law societies, the human resource professionals Association, financial planning Canada, registered insurance brokers of Ontario, so a lot of people who earn continuing education credits, it’s either pre eligible for or almost 100% of the time it will be eligible for if they submit them. And that’s the big one that focuses in on those skills that we talked about of both de escalating so when things are getting heated and then motivating.
So how do you help somebody to move forward and focuses on understanding awareness and skills so you could have a big background in mental health, you’ll still get a lot out of the course or you could have no background in mental health and you’ll still get a lot out of the course it’s designed that way. And also that you can take it at your own time so it takes them About seven hours to go through, but we give you 120 days to complete it, because it’s designed for professionals.
And then there’s also a couple free offerings on there. One is a really short one, which I recommend all your listeners give a try, which is a burnout scale. It just says how burnt are you it’s got a picture of a guy with a horrible sunburn on. And it uses an evidence based tool in there. And you can actually see kind of where you rank in terms of should you be spending a little bit more time on your on your own mental health. So I have those online courses. And then I do live training.
And I also do public speaking at various conferences and things of that nature. That’s way to get in touch with me is either by email at Adam@QMHIconsulting.com, which stands for Quality Mental Health Interventions, Training and Consulting. So Adam@QMHIconsulting.com or if you track me down on LinkedIn, I’m always happy to make new connections. I love LinkedIn, because then you actually get to know a little bit more about the person as well, who’s connecting.
And if you go to mentaldiversity.com. So mental. You know, we think about diversity, usually we’re thinking more in terms of potentially, you know, skin color, religion, things of that nature. Here, we’re really talking about mental diversity in terms of how someone’s cognitive ability is, you know, on that day, how are they experiencing the world different from other people. So if you go to mentaldiversity.com, that’s where you’ll find the online courses. And I thought, to encourage some of your listeners to sign up if they use the code, Roy 50 they’ll get 50% off of the mental health for professional relationships course.
So yeah, so hopefully, and that’s Yeah, so hopefully, that’s something that people will take advantage of. All I ask in return is, uh, you know, give an honest review. Because we learned so much from that. It’s really, it’s really helpful. Okay, great. Well, we
Roy Barker 1:07:01
appreciate that. And just to challenge everybody to reach out and look at this material, it’s so important now is probably never been more important than it is now. Just, let’s see how we can help each other out where we can all just, you know, try to get along and survive. That’s what we want to do. And I think, you know, you mentioned that we just want to be heard. So we need to be good listeners as we go through that process as well. Is Anxiety Impeding You?
Adam 1:07:26
Which makes us better communicators and more likely to be heard by others. So it really is one. That’s why I love this word. It really is one of those things where like, there’s no loser, it’s a win-win across the board. Exactly,
Roy Barker 1:07:37 Is Anxiety Impeding You
exactly. Alright, Adam. Well, thanks so much. We appreciate it. that’s gonna do it for another episode of The Business of Business Podcast. course you can find us at www.The Business of Business Podcast.com we’re on all the major podcast platforms, iTunes, Stitcher, Google Spotify. If we’re not on one that you use, please reach out I’d be glad to get it added. We also are on all the major social media networks typically hang out more on Instagram. Is Anxiety Impeding You. So reach out and engage with us there. Also, a video of this interview will go up on our YouTube channel when this episode goes live. So go over and check that out. Until next time, take care of yourself and take care of your business. Thanks so much right
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