Many of y’all know that I have been using TherapyNotes as our practice EHR for over 10 years now. I’ve looked at others and I keep coming back to TherapyNotes because they do it all. If you’re interested in an EHR for your practice, you can get two free months of TherapyNotes by going to thetestingpsychologist.com/therapynotes and enter the code “testing”.
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Hey, y’all. Welcome back [00:01:00] to The Testing Psychologist. Glad to be here with you. Thank you for tuning in as always to the podcast.
This is a really cool episode. My guest, Dr. Tara Vossenkemper, is a practice consultant speaker and therapist specializing in group practice success. She has a healthy blend of depth irreverence, which you will hear on this podcast and a straightforward approach.
Tara helps practice owners navigate the complexities of hiring team dynamics and organizational culture. She’s known for her candor insights and easy to implement strategies. She’s passionate about empowering practice leaders to build thriving and sustainable businesses.
I had a lot of fun during this conversation. Tara is a new, but fast friend here in the consulting world. She reached out initially when I had made a post in a group about my recent downsizing or rightsizing of the practice. We connected pretty quickly on a variety of topics and here we are on the [00:02:00] podcast.
I mentioned that Tara is relatively irreverent. You will hear that during the podcast. So if you have little ones in the car and you don’t want them to hear a little bit of profanity, then you might skip this one till you are listening by yourself, but that’s part of what I love about Tara, she is 100% herself and you’ll figure that out pretty quickly throughout our conversation.
So we talk about “culture” and how it is such an important part of running a business although the word itself is getting a little overplayed and has almost become a cliche at this point. That’s why this is so cool to talk with Tara. We dig into a deeper idea of culture; what it is and how we define it in a mental health practice, how to create it, how we nurture it.
I think this is a useful episode for anyone out there running a practice, whether it’s small or large or very large, or maybe you’re just solo and [00:03:00] you’re thinking about hiring. I think it’s important on many levels. So please enjoy this conversation with Dr. Tara Vossenkemper.
Tara, hey, welcome to the podcast.
Dr. Tara: Hi.
Dr. Sharp: Good to have you.
Dr. Tara: Thanks.
Dr. Sharp: I’m glad that you’re here.
Dr. Tara: It’s good to be here.
Dr. Sharp: Good. I’m excited to chat with you about culture, people and this whole crazy journey of running a business and everything that goes into it, so thanks for your time.
Dr. Tara: Mm-hmm.
Dr. Sharp: Let’s start where we typically start on this podcast, which is, why this might be important to you? Of all the things that you could care about and spend time on and talk about on a [00:04:00] podcast, why are we talking about people and culture?
Dr. Tara: Culture is important to me because I’ve worked at some really terrible places. I don’t know if this is just a me-thing, but I can’t imagine being somewhere that I would hate to be, like having to work somewhere that it wasn’t relatively pleasant to be at.
I always think back from my very first job where the training was not very good and I was almost fired because I wasn’t trained well and then I ended up being great because I ended up figuring out what I was doing all the way through a more recent before I shifted into practice, a relatively recent, by recent I mean 10 years ago, but recentish for being an adult job where I remember they were hiring on adjunct faculty.
It was at [00:05:00] a university and nobody was explaining to them what was expected of them. They were just told fill out this paperwork. Nobody told them you need to fill out, this is 99. Here’s what it is. This form, here’s what it’s for. And so I ended up like taking that on.
I remember how toxic my boss was. I can’t imagine personally being in a place that I hate to be and I don’t want that for anybody. So even if my place isn’t for everybody, there’s got to be a place that’s for them. There could be a place where you love to go.
That’s lame but my response is that I don’t want to be somewhere that sucks and I don’t want people to be places where they feel like it sucks and they’re dragging their feet to go in on a Monday and they’re dreading it on Friday evening because it’s going to be Sunday soon. All of that sounds awful.
One more thing that I just realized, it’s probably [00:06:00] existential. I think everybody’s walking towards death actively, why are you wasting any time doing something that you’re not satisfied overall with doing? Do you know what I’m saying?
Why would you ever spend time doing something? Where are your values? Do things that make you feel good knowing that some days are going to be hard, of course, but broadly speaking, surround yourself with people that you like, that support you and help you be better. Also do something that you mostly love to do and/or make sure you’re doing something that is speaking to a value that you have.
I think that’s probably why, it’s funny to say out loud, it’s oh yeah, and we’re all dying. Let’s also make sure that we’re doing something we love in the process.
Dr. Sharp: Right. Oh, I love this. We’re off to the races here. We’re already talking about the slow march to death that we’re all embarking on. This is [00:07:00] right up my alley.
Dr. Tara: Perfect. I think about it way too much.
Dr. Sharp: That’s a whole other conversation. I’m going to resist the urge to …
Dr. Tara: Go down that route.
Dr. Sharp: Dwell in our existential here, and we’re going to shift it into a discussion about culture at work, which is true though. People, we spend a lot of time in our workplace and the way you describe that experience just feels, I imagine a lot of people are resonating with that, working in a place that sucks and dragging their feet and just what that feels like.
And so framing it that way totally makes sense to me. It is our job as business owners to actively work on creating a place that doesn’t suck.
Dr. Tara: Yes. And being clear about what that is with people so they know what they’re stepping into.
Dr. Sharp: Yeah.
Dr. Tara: I think there’s a lot of bait and switch that happens. I don’t even know if it’s bait and switch on purpose, I think nobody actively talks about it in [00:08:00] a hiring process or the interview process, or nobody’s vetting with the current employees to see what’s it really like there. And so you join something, maybe thinking one thing, and then you realize this is not what I expected, I wish I wouldn’t have.
Dr. Sharp: Yes. It’s funny, you bring that up. I was thinking about this question or concept as we were getting started and it’s presenting itself already, but I’m going to start with another question that goes off script, which is, what do you think is the role of self-awareness of a practice owner in developing culture.
Dr. Tara: That’s so funny. I feel like I’ve hit up against this sometimes. I think that self-awareness needs to be relatively high and this, [00:09:00] I might get in trouble or I might get pushback from people in saying that I would speculate that people who don’t have very much or who have a lower ability to engage an accurate self-reflection are going to have more trouble with the people component of employing others and also with the culture of the practice.
So I do think that self-awareness is a really important component to a healthy practice for the owner to be self-aware. I also think that, to me, that’s the beauty of therapy is that even.
I’m thinking for myself, even in the past year and a half, I started a backup with therapy in February, 2023, before I had my third child. It was February, 2023 right after a move, right after a second location. It has just been such a helpful [00:10:00] experience and journey not only personally, of course, it’s therapy, but also I see it directly translate into my practice, I see it directly translate into the people who are a part of the practice and it’s like oh, interesting, something that I was wanting to happen was actually being bottled neck by my inability to do something.
I would say unprocessed trauma is what it was, but by my inability to recognize this thing or do this thing a little bit differently, it was how I was showing up that was having this influence. I think self-awareness is really important.
Dr. Sharp: I’m with you on that. Thinking back, just as we’re talking about this, I feel like some of the most difficult times in my practice, at least, have been times when I’ve been out of touch, like my perception of what was happening and how I was interacting and presenting at work was out of alignment with, I’d say, the majority [00:11:00] opinion of my employees.
You’re talking about therapy, of course, that’s been a part of my life over the years, but I’ve also been fortunate to have two closer employees over the years who have taken the leap to pull me aside and be like, dude, I think we need to talk about this or things are going to go off the rails.
They’ve been like, you got to look at things a little bit differently here. That’s been super valuable, but yeah, I agree, self-awareness is huge and it’s an ongoing journey for us.
Dr. Tara: Just makes me think, my people know my love, I love the US version of The Office. One of my employees, she’ll say to me, I’ll be the Dwight to your Michael, she didn’t even watch the show, but she just says, I’m the Dwight to your Michael.
She’ll send me gifts sometimes of the white. She’ll sometimes give [00:12:00] some feedback about stuff or in other cases, she might hear something happening and squelch it where she’s no, that’s not … I don’t want to say 5 battles because that seems like a really strong language, but she’s always good for giving a different perspective to people who might have …
I think everybody is always going to have a variety of opinions about stuff. So it feels like if I stand in integrity with decisions that are being made in alignment with our core values and all of this stuff is true, how people receive it is not mine. That’s not my responsibility to bear.
Of course, I try to make known the intention and how decisions are made and all of that, but it may or may not fall on deaf ears sometimes depending on what it is and what’s coming up for people, so it’s nice to have a Dwight to my Michael who might advocate for the practice or for me or for a leadership team behind the scenes.
[00:13:00] Those people are invaluable. Those employees who know you, they see you a little more, they’re a little closer, they might see more clearly and stand up for you, so to speak.Dr. Sharp: Your champions of sorts.
Dr. Tara: Your champions. I like that.
Dr. Sharp: Yeah, that’s so true. Gosh, we could go so many different directions with this. Maybe we start and I feel like culture is overplayed a little bit. Even the word culture, nowadays, when I use it in interviews or something, I cringe a little bit inside, oh my God, please think of something, some other different word to use, but it’s important.
Dr. Tara: You can say vibe.
Dr. Sharp: Vibe, I can get hold of vibe.
Dr. Tara: You can do the vibe.
Dr. Sharp: Here’s the vibe. This is good. We can riff on culture synonyms. How do you [00:14:00] define it, though? As we frame the conversation, when we’re talking about culture, what does that even mean to you?
Dr. Tara: This is where I’m sorry to keep it esoteric. It’s this phenomenological experience. It’s this perceptual filter for everything related to the practice. I also love Gottman methodology. I love John and Julie Gottman’s work at Julie Schwartz Gottman.
On their sound relationship house, the positive perspective is sandwiched between conflict and above the friendship system. The craziest thing to me is that the perspective is a result of a friendship system and your ability to navigate conflict, but it’s really hard to work on directly. It’s something that you can’t quite capture exactly.
I always think of it, what’s this phrase in [00:15:00] research? It’s like the latent variables. There’s all these little points around something that are like everything’s pointing to one concept but it’s hard to exactly say, this is the concept in this very clear structure.
So when I think of culture, I think values, norms, traditions, the vibe of the practice, the essence of the practice. I was joking earlier, but those words are actually ways that I think about culture. When I walk into the space, how do I feel? Physiologically, what does it do for me? How do I feel when I interact with others?
For me, everything about my experience with a place, including my own practice is reflective. I would say maybe 85%, a lot of my experience with the place is going to be reflective of the culture of that place.
I feel like that’s a little bit like woo-woo maybe, but it is, it’s like the vibe. It can be practical. We’re talking about [00:16:00] traditions or norms or values or expectations or specific ways of interacting with each other can be reflective of culture but yeah, I would say it’s like the essence, the vibe of a place.
Dr. Sharp: I think there’s something to that. It’s almost like the whole is greater than the sum of the parts, the mind versus the brain, there are lots of analogies to capture it.
I’m curious, if you found this, I think I have, as I’m saying it out loud that there have been times when we’ve almost tried to engineer culture and it backfired, like when we were almost working too hard and then that somehow tipped the scales in the opposite direction to what we were going for. Has that ever happened in your practice? I’m working through this, like how much is [00:17:00] deliberate versus unintentional?
Dr. Tara: Yeah, it makes me think of the point of diminishing returns; at what point is it actually too much? And then it starts to, or like too much anxiety is detrimental. A healthy amount of anxiety is good for performance, but too little or too much is not.
I’m thinking of almost like fluidity, flexibility and adaptability. These phrases are coming to my mind. For me, I’m always interested in front-loading the work. I think probably because I’m a Kolbe Quick Start, I want to get shit done. Let’s go create something, do it and then let it work.
And so I think the same thing with people, when you say the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, I’m thinking about the people are part of creating and maintaining culture. The [00:18:00] responsibility of every person at the practice is keeping this entity, which is the practice and the culture of the practice alive and healthy. It’s not just on me. It’s on every single person. I might have my finger on the pulse of it in a very different way, but everybody is involved in this.
And so when I think about front-loading the work with culture, I think about hiring. Who are we bringing on? How are we making decisions about them through a culture focused lens? Because if they fit and they know what’s important to us, and they’re interested in this thing, then theoretically they’re going to be at least somewhat invested in keeping it alive in a healthy way.
And then if we spend time, I don’t think it needs to be this every day, I’m sending out emails about live out the core values, do this thing but what I do know is that more often than not, [00:19:00] more clear messages about culture focus things are better. I don’t think that it means that you need to be doing these major giant gestures of moves like we’re revamping our culture.
I don’t think it needs to be like this, but if you know what comprises your culture, if you say, I know my core values are really important in keeping my culture healthy, then I might highlight core values on a weekly basis and say, hey, I want to give a shout out to this person for living out this core value.
Hey, #on your shit, good job so and so for doing blah, blah, blah. I might do things like that on a weekly basis. I know in our quarter meetings, our quarterly state of the practice meetings are about the vision, where we’re going, why we’re going that direction, whether or not leadership did what they said they would do over the previous quarter by completing our goals, what are the goals to get us to closer to our vision in the next quarter and what are our core values and how are we living them [00:20:00] out?
We do things like that. I would say, for me, that’s not overkill. I don’t want to shove it down somebody’s throat. I’m not trying to like force feed people this stuff but there’s also this balance between if I don’t say it enough, they’re not going to be thinking about this. It’s not going to be top of mind for them.
For me, it’s not set it and forget it, it’s bring on the right people and then consistently send messages about culture. Maybe not daily, you need to live this out not in a chastising way, in a celebratory way. I’m done. I’m just talking a lot. I’m good though. That’s it. I think I answered your question is what I’m trying to say, maybe.
Dr. Sharp: Yeah. No, this is good. It’s bringing up these different points of where the culture can happen [00:21:00] and where we can be a little bit more deliberate about infusing the knowns of culture and maybe planting the seeds to let it grow organically and watering too, if we want to keep going with that metaphor.
You mentioned hiring, to me, and it sounds like we maybe agree on this, that’s the first place that you start to build a sense of culture for the folks in your practice. What do you think about that?
Dr. Tara: I absolutely unequivocally agree. Yes. Not only in our phone screen, I encourage anybody that works with me about hiring related things. They’re going to get a similar script.
In our phone screen process, which is our first leg of hiring, we do two of things but in that phone screen process, my director of clinical operations, she has a list of core values or my integrator, depending on if we’re [00:22:00] hiring admin or clinical staff. She will basically ask them specific questions related to core values.
So if one of our core values is own your shit, which that is one of our core values, so basically taking responsibility. If you know Gottman, you know that’s the antidote to defensiveness. So we’re also trying to not have any horsemen come traipsing through the practice. So own your shit.
She might say, the question, it might be something like, tell me about the last time you messed up; what did you do and how did it go? What did you do to rectify that and what was the outcome? Tell me how it went.
If people can’t come up with an example, to me, that indicates they probably aren’t actively taking ownership of what they need to be. If they tell a story about how they’ve been wronged, people are wronged. There are absolutely 100% victims in this world, not every [00:23:00] experience in every single person’s life is a 100% victim.
There are moments where everybody messes up. Tell me about a time where you messed something up. If you can’t, that tells me something else. And so that for me is, right away, we’re asking, how are you living out our core values without directly asking this? That’s what we’re assessing in that phone screen. Give me these examples of how you’re living these things out.
So right away, this is setting the stage for, I say setting the stage, maybe it’s like weeding out the wheat from the chaff; separating the wheat from the chaff. I don’t know what chaff is but it’s like separating these things. It’s something on a grain, it’s like the stock of wheat. It’s something.
Dr. Sharp: Yeah.
Okay. We got it.
Context clues.
Dr. Tara: It’s something like that. Context clues. It’s farming.
Dr. Sharp: Something you don’t want. I don’t think we want chaff.
Dr. Tara: We don’t want chaff. Maybe it’s used for something else, but [00:24:00] we’re going with planting seeds. We planted wheat, now we’re separating the wheat from the chaff. So right away, we’re doing this thing. And then later in that process, when we do something, we do a meet-and-greet as well. No leadership is included in the meet-and-greet, it’s just our hiring team, whoever is a part of it.
Anybody can be a part. That’s not true, there’s only a certain amount of people at a time, but then they’re the ones who actively talk about the culture of the practice, their whole goal is you need to make sure this person is a culture fit and you want to make sure they feel like they’re a fit with us.
So it’s like each party’s interviewing the other, but it’s we’re hanging out together and then they’re talking about the culture of the practice and what it’s like to be here. They’re answering questions. It’s this fluid experience. For me, right away, we are separating the wheat from the chaff, but we’re also starting to talk about culture in that same [00:25:00] process.
I know at some point, I haven’t done this, my role is very different in the hiring process at this point, but we will actively say, the practice culture is very important. We are not willing to bring folks on who don’t fit or who don’t feel like they’re going to fit.
It has to be not only clinically but also culturally; this is part of the deal. It’s not just you’re really good at this one thing, but you hate working with people and you keep everything to yourself. That’s not going to work. That’s not going to fit for us. It’s a very extreme example. We’ve never had that happen.
Dr. Sharp: Sure.
Dr. Tara: I think that answers your question maybe a little bit.
Dr. Sharp: Oh, absolutely. I love those elements. We do that meet-and-greet as well in the hiring process and it’s great. People get to see what it’s like and see what the people are like too, and that’s a big component; am I going to get along with a lot of the folks [00:26:00] here?
So hiring is one component. That’s where we’re planting these seeds of culture. Where else does it come up in your practice? Where do you see culture manifesting and being infused?
Dr. Tara: I don’t mean to cop out. My thought is everywhere. It permeates every part of how we interact and exist with each other. And so when people are hired, for example, we right away get them personalized swag like personalized gifts because I want to create belonging with them right away if you’re hired even before you start.
There’s been times where somebody has started right before our quarterly event or right before we have Christmas in July as like an event. Maybe their start date is right after, but they accept the offer before, guess [00:27:00] who’s invited? You’re invited, bring your family, come on and meet us, that sort of thing.
If you’re here, you are one of us now. You get your little fancy picture taken. Of course, there’s marketing stuff and all that but also here’s a tumbler with your name on it. Here is this padfolio with your name lasered on it. Nice little things that are practice related but also personalized, unique to this person.
In our onboarding process, we do 90 days of onboarding. I like to spread it out for a reason. We are very intentional with, we’re sharing information, there’s video trainings throughout, but also inviting questions, inviting feedback, what’s not going well for you.
That’s one of my favorite questions is not to ask, hey, how are things going but what’s not working? Tell me what’s going wrong. [00:28:00] Because if I’m inviting negative feedback, what I’m doing is I’m actively seeking out authenticity and candor, which is also one of our values. I am also indirectly forcing vulnerability, which is really healthy for a workplace.
If I can also say, hey, I messed this up in your process. I should have done this. It might not feel vulnerable to do, but to be someone higher up saying I messed up, you’re modeling vulnerability for a person who’s new and doesn’t know you at all.
You’re saying, hey, it’s okay to make mistakes. That’s not only owning your shit, which is a value, that’s also vulnerability and safety, which is, I love The Culture Code from a Daniel Coyle perspective. Those are two very important components.
In the beginning, whenever someone comes on, we say, look, this is where we’re going. This is our vision. That’s purpose. We’re [00:29:00] here to do these things together. This is who we are. This is what we do.
You’re setting the stage for vision and forward momentum, and we’re doing this together. All of those things are ways of not only creating culture but ensuring that people know what it’s like to be here and know what it’s like to be a part of this special group and to move together.
So for me, like I said, it’s everywhere, when we do consultations, when we highlight people. When we review people, we’re reviewing people based on values. I do annual reviews, which isn’t very much but we do big… we always have feedback going.
There’s always open dialogue around metrics and numbers and hey, this is a struggle. What’s going on? You need some help. Okay. Meet with your clinical team lead. Let’s process through this thing, whatever.
On a twice a year [00:30:00] basis, operations team and clinical team, there’s two big reviews. Even those reviews are about core values and practice culture. They’re not about performance because we’re doing performance all the time.
I don’t give a fuck about performance right now. You’re literally doing this all the time. I want to know how you feel about being here. I want to know what see as your future for the practice. What are your goals in life outside of our practice? How do we help make that happen for you? What role can we play to facilitate what you want out of your life? For me, that’s all culture related.
It’s funny because I like people a lot. I’m not very sociable, so if you invited me to a party, I probably wouldn’t want to go, but if I was there, I would really like the people and then I would just be done like, all right, peace out. Thanks.
Do the old good old Irish goodbye, walk out the door, but I [00:31:00] love people. I’m interested in them. I want to know more about them. I want to know about how they think and why they feel the way that they feel, how they feel and all those things.
And so I think that some of this was born out of that; I don’t want to sit and tell somebody what they’re doing right or wrong, I want to embed feedback in everything we’re doing so that if we get to that place where we’re having a serious discussion, none of it’s new, you know where we are.
For me, the annual review, I wanted it to be more culture and people focused because all the other stuff was already taking place so it felt like a waste of time. If we’re doing performance stuff all the time, why am I going to sit with you once a year and tell you about your performance? We can talk about how you feel about how things are going instead. Does that make sense?
Dr. Sharp: It does. It mirrors what we do in our practice as well. I know we’re both EOS driven [00:32:00] and so that’s probably a lot of coincidence. I like that model so much better where your “performance evaluations” are alignment with values and how things are going in the practice.
We have a question on our evaluations which is something like, what is one thing that we could do from a leadership standpoint to make this a better place to work? What’s one thing that could take this to the next level for you?
The answers have ranged from, could I get a new chair to can we have better retirement matching, it goes all over the place. It’s nice to solicit that feedback and create more of a collaborative environment.
Dr. Tara: And even with that, I’m so sorry, I think I cut you off.
Dr. Sharp: You’re good.
Dr. Tara: My thought is, even with that, I knew at the very beginning, I remember teaching [00:33:00] before I started the practice, I taught some community mental health program or course for master’s program back in St. Louis.
It’s somewhere in the book. I just remember feeling so validated reading this and then it has come up for me since. It was something about if you’re doing anything in community mental health, you need the buy-in of the community, which is a fucking duh, of course, but you need the buy-in. Any ideas you have; people want a say in what’s happening.
Every time I think about the practice, we’ve done some version of meet-and-greets from the very inception. Before I had this thorough hiring process, I knew I wanted people involved because a person was joining our team. It’s not, they’re joining me, they’re joining the team.
And that the team at the time was a lot of interns and supervisees. And so it was like, I want their buy-in [00:34:00] too. I knew that if people were involved in the process, they would feel more invested and bought into the process, which might sound gross and manipulative. That’s not the intention.
The thought was, I want them to feel as invested as possible. Of course, no one’s going to be as invested as I am, but I want people’s involvement and influence because they are here and they are important to the team and to the practice. And so what they need and what they want is a value.
It’s almost feels like it’s not just me, the practice is this vessel or this entity that’s reflective of all the people, everybody makes this up. It’s not just Tara’s practice. Logistically, it is, but in terms of a culture wise, it’s not just my practice, it’s verybody, we’re all here doing this together.
Dr. Sharp: Yeah. Let me ask a potentially difficult question, something I’ve wrestled with so it’s as a selfish question, like many of my questions.
Dr. Tara: No, [00:35:00] do it.
Dr. Sharp: I’m curious how you approach and balance this dynamic of helping folks feel involved, part of the process, collaborative and so forth like you’re describing and retaining the, I still make the decision aspect of it. If that’s the direction you go maybe you don’t, I don’t know.
Dr. Tara: No, that is definitely the direction I go.
Dr. Sharp: Let’s take a break to hear from our featured partner.
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Let’s get back to the podcast
Dr. Tara: Carefully, the answer is carefully. I tried lightly. I don’t know if it’s tried lightly, there’s this constant internal of like the bottom of the triangle, not a pyramid, I guess it would have to be some sort of a pyramid, but a three systems scale, not the scales of justice, but a scale with three balances, if that makes sense.
Dr. Sharp: Yes.
Dr. Tara: Okay. Thanks. You know what I’m trying to say, right?
Dr. Sharp: Yeah.
Dr. Tara: Autonomy is definitely one. I do not ever want people to feel like they have no [00:38:00] autonomy. The Structure of the business is another. There has to be structure in place for us to do things streamlined and uniform. And then the sustainability and longevity of the business is the third.
I’ve shared this openly with people. If my team ever heard, this wouldn’t be new. Maybe the way I’m talking about it might feel new, but I’m constantly balancing the practice financial health with the structure to make it flow healthy, effectively, efficiently for clients, for the team, for me, for operations team, for everybody, and then also autonomy for clinicians.
And so I think with vision decisions are not the team is to make. There’s limits where it’s like no, where we’re going is not, you all don’t see the horizon in the same way that I do and so it doesn’t make sense to me that I would task you or ask you [00:39:00] to make this decision or to even have a say in this decision when you don’t have the same view that I have.
Whilst if you are interested in niching down, you’re interested in supervision, you’re interested in growing a certain type of, you want to do something new or slightly different, walk and talk therapy is not something, that’s a silly example, but a clinician came to me and said, I want to do that. It was like, cool, let’s get the right documents on file and fucking make it happen. Have fun.
Somebody else came to me and said, I want to create this track within the practice. That sounds awesome. It’s not only in alignment with where we’re going, but you are interested in doing this.
So those are the sorts of things where it’s like people have space to grow and evolve within the practice, but the parameters of the practice are relatively the same. They will grow and evolve. [00:40:00] As we do, opportunities will also grow and evolve. I say carefully, people have autonomy but it’s within the confines of this structure that we have in place right now at its current capacity, knowing it’s going to get bigger as we go.
I had someone the other day say they would love to do a podcast, that’d be awesome. We’ve had a recent discussion about podcasting so, of course, I’m thinking about our discussion and the intention of doing that from a practice perspective. I’m thinking about marketing, I’m thinking about financially, how would that make sense? I’m running through all of this stuff, knowing we’ve wanted to do a podcast for the practice for a long time, is this something I could make happen now?
My feedback to this person was that’s been on the docket for a long time. I am not saying no; I’m not saying yes right now. Let me think about it. Let me figure out if this is something we can do and how it might happen. Thanks for letting me know this.
[00:41:00] I will absolutely consider this and probably take it to leadership and discuss, and then go back to the person and let them know, here’s what we think, here’s what was decided.Carefully was a flippant answer, but it does feel careful. I can’t ever let people be further than where we are because then that disrupts the flow and the structure of things. And also if I’m eating into profitability, then I’m fucking everybody over, not just myself, everybody is messed up.
Everybody gets fucked over if the profitability of the practice is not healthy, because then if the practice goes under, everyone’s gone.
Dr. Sharp: It’s so true.
Dr. Tara: I think carefully is accurate, carefully and then those are the things that I’m constantly seeking to balance.
Dr. Sharp: I like the way that you conceptualize it as this three-legged stool situation or three-legged scale. [00:42:00] That makes sense to me.
It is a component, and folks feeling some agency and autonomy. We know that’s a big part of workplace satisfaction, is having control over what you do, what’s happening in your environment and having that be a component, and it’s got a balance with these other components that are equally important.
Dr. Tara: Yeah. Because you’re part of something. If you’re a solo practitioner and you want to do a podcast, more power to you, have fun, do it. It’s your own time. It’s your own money. It’s your own energy. It’s your own investment. It’s all on you.
When you’re doing that as part of a larger system, nobody at the practice exists in a silo, and so I hate busy work, it enrages me to do things that don’t need to be done, but we’re just doing them because we’ve always done it. No, I feel like Michael, [00:43:00] no, God, no, I’m not going to do that.
So anything that we do, I’m constantly thinking, this is no stone left unturned to call it neuroses, it’s probably some compulsion. Why are we doing it this way? Do we actually need to do that extra step? What’s the function of this thing?
And if there’s no function for it, I’m going to flick it out of the process like okay, it doesn’t exist. We don’t need to do something that doesn’t have a purpose. And so I think nobody exists in a silo. If somebody wants to do something, we have to figure out how it fits in everywhere. We have to find out how it fits in everywhere.
And then conversely, if we go to do something and we stumble across something that’s not functional, we’re just going to get rid of it. I’m not going to keep something, I started talking about this for a different reason. I forgot why. So I will just stop talking at this point. Thanks.
Dr. Sharp: It still ended up in a good [00:44:00] direction. I love this. I feel like we’re living parallel lives in so many ways. Even this topic of efficiency and not taking extra steps in your processes and systems and all of that. We could totally go down that path.
I am curious, just a little bit of a sidebar, because you’ve mentioned two of your values now that match very closely to two of our values. So now I want to hear your other values and see how close they are to ours.
Dr. Tara: The first is authenticity and candor; be authentic and candid, they’re all the same tense. The next is have depth and fun. It’s not just depth, we don’t need to walk around, you know the episode of South Park where Wendy Testaburger breaks up with Stan, and he turns Goth or Emo or something, and then Butter’s little Raisins girlfriend dumps him. He’s like, oh, it’s a beautiful kind of sadness, but Stan’s all like Moby and Goth.
[00:45:00] We don’t need to be Stan. It doesn’t always have to be, oh gosh, I could talk all day about this. Life is deep. We’re marching to death. I cannot extricate myself from being a meaning making creature in a meaningless life.So the creation of meaning and living a deep life and purpose and intention, all of that is great, but also I’m going to fucking laugh at a fart joke. I’m going to make them. I’m going to laugh at them. I’m going to watch silly videos.
For me, it’s the combo of the both. I might be crying and laughing, not labile, but crying about something meaningful and giggling next. This is so ridiculous, I just put my dog down and I’m laughing at the fact that the lady down the hallway is calling her to follow her.
I’m like, she’s deaf. It’s like God, up here we are. It was so sad, but also I’m giggling, she’s deaf. [00:46:00] She’s not going to hear you. Oh, anyway, the absurdity of all is funny. So be authentic and candid, have depth and fun, be excellence oriented and growth centric.
So you’re not always going to be excellent, but strive for excellence and growth centricity, own your shit. And the other is embrace interdependence. What’s funny about this is we got rid of somebody who wanted to exist in a silo. We didn’t get rid of them, they left and it was a good departure. It was a good leave. The conversation after was like something was not fitting. They wanted to exist in a vacuum.
I had a former client say to me once, this is all happening at the same time, a former client said to me something about [00:47:00] all hands on deck was one of the values of maybe the Navy. I don’t remember. Some form of armed forces, all hands on deck, no, many hands make light work.
I felt like I’m my mind blown in that moment, that’s exactly the thing, that’s exactly it. And so this embrace interdependence came as a result of this employee leaving who wanted to exist in a vacuum and the realization we need to know that people know that they’re a part of something that’s very interconnected.
The practice’s of spider web of roles, systems and processes. Every little move you make has ramifications for the entire rest of the system. So if you want to go rogue, you’re going to fuck somebody else over in the process. Somebody else is going to bear the weight of what just happened because you did something that was not what was discussed or had planned, or that’s for me, [00:48:00] the structure of the business piece.
The autonomy pieces follow the process with the forms and whatnot. You have to get an ROI on file to do this thing. That’s an ethical example. Let’s say, we want this form on process to do walk and talk therapy, instead, you did walk and talk therapy and your person fell and now we’re being sued.
You just messed up a lot. A lot of other people are now bearing the weight of this thing that if you just want to did what we asked, so that’s the structure plus the autonomy. We want you to be able to do this thing, but we also know the safety of the practice, I don’t feel like that’s the exact right word, but the structure is important. So I keep going back to that.
Those are the values; have depth and fun, authenticity and candor, excellence oriented and growth centric, own your shit, which is my favorite and the embracing interdependence.
Dr. Sharp: I love it.
Dr. Tara: Thanks.
[00:49:00] Dr. Sharp: This is good. We have a lot of overlap. We have fewer but the umbrellas are maybe a little bigger. So ours are, get after it, which encompasses the own your shit, get your shit done, always be getting better.We have get after it. We have keep it real, which is very much like your candor and authenticity. We have conversations when we need to. That’s part of growing. That’s part of getting better. We have balance we with me, we default to supporting one another.
That’s the go to mentality is that we’re there for one another. This is a group collaborative thing and never to the point of being a martyr and or getting resentful and that kind of thing. So like that autonomy versus group. And then our last one is be active allies, which is the [00:50:00] social just to see component. It’s the affirmation of different groups and all that kind of stuff.
That’s so interesting. It’s really cool to hear this. I don’t think I’ve talked with any other EOS practice owners about all the values, where they came from, what they mean and stuff. Thanks for going down that path for a second.
Dr. Tara: Yeah. Cool. Thanks for asking. It’s funny, when I consult with people, values always come up because they, I had someone ask me just the other day, here’s a situation, how do I handle it? It was something happened with an employee. I was like, what do your values say? How would you be living them out or not if you did or didn’t engage in that discussion?
Dr. Sharp: Yes.
Dr. Tara: For me, it’s always like they actively answer problems. Anytime we’ve run into issues, because our values have evolved over the years as well. What they started [00:51:00] with, some have remained basically the same, but they’ve evolved.
We used to have a striving for multicultural and social justice competence, and then we collectively decided that it was more of a, I really like the alley, the way that you language yours, though, but it was like if this is pay to play as part of the profession, then would it make more sense for it to be? It was a long discussion on, should we keep this one?
Dr. Sharp: That’s so interesting. We had the same process with that value. We were like, is this table stakes or is this actually a value that goes beyond what’s just expected in this field? I’m right with you.
Dr. Tara: It’s a discussion. It was a hard decision. It was a hard discussion. Some of the value changes have been a result of people issues. And so it’s interesting to me also, we’re running into this people problem. We’ve done this values analysis. And [00:52:00] for me, that’s like, what are we missing in our core values that’s not addressing the thing that I’m seeing right here?
Something’s happening. We have a hole; we have a gap somewhere. And so as they stand now, our values, I always think of it like paper mache in this balloon. They cover the entire space of the balloon, from my perspective, currently.
When something else happens, they might evolve, but they’ve been pretty steady for, I’m going to say a year and a half or something. It hasn’t been a crazy amount of time, but it’s like, I don’t know, every quarter, we look at the values and we grapple with them and say, are these still it? Is this exactly what we want it to be? Is this who we are? Is this how we want to exist together? Is this how we want to engage and operate?
The answer for a few quarters now has been, yeah, these are spot on, [00:53:00] and they have been. When we do values analysis for analyses or a values analysis for a person or values analyses for people, they get at everything we want them to get at.
Dr. Sharp: Yeah. I like that you’re bringing that up. It is cool and it is an evolving process. I think that’s easy to forget sometimes. When we set values for our practice, it feels really exciting the first time around and affirming and oh, we’ve nailed it. This is what we’re all about.
Dr. Tara: This is so great.
Dr. Sharp: It’s so great. I’m guilty of this too. I like to land on things and then stick to them, but they do have to evolve when you run into situations over time; both positive and negative where there are teaching moments and there are affirming moments of what your values are.
I’d like that we’re coming back to this. I feel like a lot of the culture does come from values because [00:54:00] values are reflection of beliefs, which drive behavior, which creates that intangible stuff that just percolates through your practice. That’s all the parts thing, and they provide an anchor for what you do then.
Dr. Tara: Yes. They feel like the thing that’s easiest to say, like if you’re living this out, tell me how you’re living this out. If we see own your shit and someone comes to me and says, I messed this up, then it’s obvious. Thanks for telling me. Cool. How do we fix it? What do we need to do?
That may or may not require me to be involved. That usually does not, at this point, which is great because I’ve people in place to help deal with some of the issues that come up, but without values, it’s like, how do you say what you want?
[00:55:00] A value is subjective. Like you’re saying, I want this thing and it can look any number of ways, but when I can see something happen and I can say, oh, that’s evidence of this value being lived out, in my mind, it’s like that shifts to objectivity; that’s an objective point of data.And so when I go to do something like an annual review, or I’m asking somebody to reflect on their own how they’re living out the values, which is something I have people do, then they can make it objective. It’s like, oh damn, I am not really living this one out. I’m really not doing this.
I’m definitely doing this one, here’s how and why. I think it makes it much more tangible for every single person. I’m just reiterating what you just said. So I agree with you. I agree with that. Thank you, Jeremy.
There’s two more things too actually that I’m just thinking of. [00:56:00] Of course, The Culture Code, I already said this. I love Daniel Coyle. He might be the only person I’ve written fan mail to. I wrote him an email and he’s from St. Louis too, which is cool because I’m from St. Louis.
Dr. Sharp: That was cool. That’s the only book, by the way, that I have listened to twice all the way through; full audio book two times through. It was so good.
Dr. Tara: So good. I always think of Papa bitch. Oh my God, I think of the examples from that book, how Tylenol handled the arsenic.
Dr. Sharp: Yeah.
Dr. Tara: God, incredible with their manifesto or their creed or the credo, I think. So good. The bad apple experiment, the kindergarten experiment. All of his examples are incredible.
I wrote up an email, I was like, I tried to read Start with Why by Simon Sinek and I was really bored. I was like, this is way better than Simon Sinek’s Start with Why for the record. He was like, thank you. Because I know it’s a really [00:57:00] popular book that I’m like, I’m bored reading that but this book is incredible.
The other thing that I always think about with culture, it’s funny because it feels like it should be an indirect effect rather than something, gosh, I think how we engage with each other is our core values, how we feel about the entity is the culture code; vulnerability, belongingness, purpose.
How people feel internally about their role, I always draw on Cal Newport. I love Cal Newport too from So Good They Can’t Ignore You. He writes about competence, autonomy, and relatedness being three necessary components for people feeling like they have a calling.
And so I want to know how do people feel about the work that they’re doing? How do they feel about the practice vibe, meaning like the vulnerability, belongingness, [00:58:00] purpose? And then how do they feel about the way we engage with each other?
And like all of those, they feel, I think about a bigger balloon and larger paper mache, core values is one nested balloon, then the largest one is all three of those things getting out. What is the big experience being here in your role with these people?
And so I seek to figure out as much as possible, I want all of that information from people. With reviews, I’m asking all of these things. When I’m talking with them, I want to talk about all of these things because they’re all important for different reasons.
I think that can feel overwhelming. As I’m saying it out loud, it’s like, that might feel like a lot, but if you front-load the work and once it’s there, it’s not. It gets baked into everything that you’re already doing.
[00:59:00] Dr. Sharp: Right. I hear you. I want to validate or maybe make it okay or something for it to be a lot. This is the work, it’s not always hard, but it’s deliberate at least, to make all this happen and run a business on purpose and shape things in a certain way. It is deliberate.Dr. Tara: Yeah, that’s fair. On purpose. I like that. Yes, it is on purpose and intentional. No move. I get wild hairs all the time, but I have to check myself and use leadership now. Decisions aren’t just made on a whim.
Sometimes they are, but primarily it’s like, how does this fit with the rest of the things?
And maybe it’s a [01:00:00] mental exercise. I think there is some component or something to be said for. I wouldn’t say it’s exhausting. I think it can be tiresome whenever you’re struggling with something and you’re trying to figure out what’s happening, what’s going wrong or what’s going on to keep your finger on the pulse of things.
I think maybe that can be exhausting sometimes depending on the type of, it just depends. This is where temperament plays a part too. My history is emotional caretaking. So for me, it’s like I’m naturally inclined to worry and care for the people around. I want to know, how are you? How are you doing? How do you feel? What’s wrong? What’s going on?
And so my work has been reining it back. There is discomfort letting it happen for people and relying more on okay, I need to keep this closer to me because the rest is going to be like, if I’m pulled too much by the people around me, it’s [01:01:00] depleting. I feel like it’s never enough.
And so for somebody who’s tendency might be more avoidance, it might need to be like you need to lean into the people around you a little bit more versus someone like me, I needed to pull back a little, but always there does need to be attention paid to the people who are part of what you are trying to create and build.
Dr. Sharp: Well said. That might be a good place to wrap up. I feel like we could talk about this stuff forever. This has been great. There’s so many threads that I did not pull on. I’m like, we could talk about that for an hour and this for an hour.
This has been a lot of fun. I know you’ve got a lot going on. If people want to reach out, talk to you, do things with you, what does that look like?
Dr. Tara: They can go to my website. It was a mess for a long time. It’s [01:02:00] finally a little bit cleaner and more in alignment with not necessarily how I show up but also what I’m seeking to do with consulting and in that area. So the website is taravossenkemper.com.
There is a freebie resource called your last hiring process. So if you are on the website, there’s something called bonus and then free resources, and you can find that there. On the website, you also can book a discovery call with me. I stole that language from you. So thank you for letting me borrow and take it, Jeremy. I appreciate that.
I’m just now telling you, so I hope you don’t care, but I did use that language. Discovery call is a 15-minute call to see if we wanted to work together ever, what it might look like, or who might be a better fit for you or if I could even help with whatever issue you might be having.
I have a membership. [01:03:00] It’s focused on practice growth, but the emphasis is on the practice culture. So the membership is called the Practice Culture First Membership. I have a promo offer for your people listening who might be interested. There’s a 14-day free trial. I sent you a link. I don’t know if I could ask that be put in show notes or something.
Dr. Sharp: Absolutely. We’ll put it all in the show notes.
Dr. Tara: Sweet. So mostly my website, I think that would be the easiest place to seek me out, taravossenkemper.com.
Dr. Sharp: Nice. That sounds good. All that stuff will be easy to access in the show notes for folks. I hope people reach out. It’s been fun.
Dr. Tara: Yeah, I hope too.
Dr. Sharp: Definitely. We have only interacted four or five times now.
Dr. Tara: I think it’s two times. We click man. It’s only been three, I think. It’s our third time.
Dr. Sharp: Yeah. [01:04:00] It’s pretty cool. You’re one of the most genuine, authentic people.
Dr. Tara: It’s really nice.
Dr. Sharp: I’ve interacted with, and that goes a long way. It’s instantly endearing.
Dr. Tara: That’s so nice.
Dr. Sharp: So thanks for sharing that with the audience and I think it came through here as well.
Dr. Tara: And that is super validating because the practice values authentic and candid, boom, trying to live it out.
Dr. Sharp: You’re doing it.
Dr. Tara: Thank you. I appreciate that.
Dr. Sharp: Thanks, Tara.
Dr. Tara: Cool. Thanks.
Dr. Sharp: All right, y’all. Thank you so much for tuning into this episode, always grateful to have you here. I hope that you take away some information that you can implement in your practice and in your life. Any resources that we mentioned during the episode will be listed in the show notes so make sure to check those out.
If you like what you hear on the podcast, I would be so grateful if you left a review on iTunes or Spotify or wherever you listen to your [01:05:00] podcast.
If you’re a practice owner or aspiring practice owner, I’d invite you to check out The Testing Psychologist mastermind groups. I have mastermind groups at every stage of practice development; beginner, intermediate and advanced. We have homework, we have accountability, we have support, we have resources. These groups are amazing. We do a lot of work and a lot of connecting.
If that sounds interesting to you, you can check out the details at thetestingpsychologist.com/consulting. You can sign up for a pre-group phone call, we will chat and figure out if a group could be a good fit for you. Thanks so much.
The information contained in this podcast [01:06:00] and on The Testing Psychologist website are intended for informational and educational purposes only. Nothing in this podcast or on the website is intended to be a substitute for professional, psychological, psychiatric, or medical advice, diagnosis or treatment.
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