Dr. Adaira Landry
Appearances
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
Oh, I'm glad I met you too. And thank you so much for this really amazing conversation, Vince.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
We had initially actually picked the name Chiseled. That was what the book was going to be called, Chiseled. I love that word. But we got some feedback that it was a little too vague, perhaps a little too, it might be construed as too masculine of a term. Is it like someone who's like buff or it just wasn't used well in the workplace. It didn't transfer over, I think, as a workplace word.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
And we got some feedback that probably is not going to be the final word. And so I think we started thinking about what is it that we want to for the reader to get out of the book. And I think this idea of micro skills comes actually from a term that I heard when I was training to be a doctor. So what happens often in medicine is you have to do this large procedure.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
Let's say we have to put a catheter in someone's neck, right? But that's like a 40 step, 50 step process. And so for each of those steps, you can really learn how to hold your fingers, how to hold the tubing, how to position the patient. You can optimize each of those things. And a lecture I heard when I was a resident was actually titled micro skills for placing this catheter.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
It was that's what it was called. And I loved that title. And so when I was thinking about. what word we could use. I went back to that lecture and I thought to myself, I remember that in that lecture, they weren't teaching the grand scheme of everything, but they were going into the minutia. These are the things you had never considered about this particular procedure.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
So I think we wanted that idea when it comes to the workplace. Many of us want to be better at communication. Many of us want to be better at navigating conflict. But if you don't get into the weeds of it, then you can totally miss some really important skill sets.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
And so we really wanted to dive really deep into those critical actions and key aspects of developing these larger goals that many of us set.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
I love this question. You have great questions. I think you're right. If you look at most business shelves or shelves in the business book section of the store, it's like communication, leadership, team management. I think there's a gap, though, for those of us who just want to get better quickly, holistically.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
And I think there's actually a lot of people, especially as the millennials and Gen Zers are entering the workspace, where they want fast results. They want that immediate impact. And having them need to read 20 books, 10 books, 15 books before they get there, I think, is not listening to the audience.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
And so we really felt like we were understanding the shift to just like quick knowledge, short attention span, cut some of the fat, lessen the data and get straight to the point. And that was really important because that really goes back to our background in education.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
If I have to give a lecture and I only have one teaching point, but I'm giving a ton of data, a ton of background, my audience might get lost. Right. And so we really wanted to just trim a lot of that fat out and get straight to the point.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
In terms of why we wanted this big comprehensive book is we knew that we could, as we trimmed out a lot of the data, we could cover a lot more ground and it would become this like comprehensive starting place for people who are especially entering the workplace. Yes, you might need additional resources.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
So at the end of every chapter, of course, we have more reading and additional things that they can watch and stuff. But we feel like this would be enough where if you just read this book, you would be like light years ahead because there's so much there's so much content that it would at least alert you to, OK, this is how I avoid conflict. This is how I build brand or expertise.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
This is how I care for myself. And so even though it's not a lot of depth, it at least is highlighting a lot of topics and creating awareness there. We have actually initially wanted the book to be just for early career professionals. We mentioned that in the intro. We have found mid-career, senior career professionals still finding it helpful and full of information that they had not learned.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
So I think there's still value across the career span, but I think there's a lot more value for that early career professional who's like, why does it seem like everyone else has it figured out and I don't? I've said this before.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
It varies day by day, truly. Because, and that's how we wanted the book to be, where you could just turn to the table of contents and pick the section that you feel like you are going through right now and read that section. So it doesn't have to be read to cover, but it could be.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
I think for me right now, I'm actually really in this space of micro skills for learning how to grab your next opportunity. And one of the things, the specific micro skill within that chapter is pausing before you accept an opportunity. So I was of the mindset of, Growing up, I was like fully subscribing to this mantra of say yes to everything. You probably have heard that before.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
At least it's very common in my field of medicine, which is like if someone offers you an opportunity, you say yes. You say yes, especially early on because you never know what you're missing out on. So I fully engaged in this belief and I said yes to everything for many years. And that led me to feeling like the burnout, the overwork, The feeling like you're behind all the time is normal.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
Like that should be how it is because we're always saying yes. That means we're not filtering things out. And without that discernment, you just are saying yes to a lot of noise, a lot of what's called non-promotable work, things that don't really help scale your career or even help your reputation grow.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
So I think we put this micro skill in there because we want people to know that it's OK to not impulsively say yes and to really inquire and learn what's in front of you and see if it's worth your time. That strategic skill I learned really late. Even when it came to picking my field of emergency medicine, I didn't explore it to a depth that I would if I was picking a specialty now.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
Like there weren't questions that I was asking. I was just like, oh, this seems fun. But I wasn't thinking about it in a much deeper level. And so this idea of probing, investigating before you commit to something can really help you understand that. what the return on investment is. I didn't come up with these terms, but there's two terms that I love. FOMO, the fear of missing out.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
And then the converse is JOMO, the joy of missing out. And I think a lot of us fear that if we say no, oh boy, we lost our chance. It'll never come again. And that's hardly ever true, especially if you have real ambition, real talent. JOMO is freedom. It's relief. It's space. It's mental health protection.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
It's this idea of finding the blue ocean and saying, I really want to go this way because I've thought about what makes sense to me versus just reflexively saying yes to everything. And so that was an important micro skill for me because for many years I packed my plate. All of those things I was saying yes to were just horizontal. It was flat. It was just like all those things were just...
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
Flat additions, add-ons versus actual vertical climb.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
You asked a wonderful question, so this is not a critique. But I will say that we wanted a book that was fast impact and people could actually detect their change immediately. And the promise of the book is that if you buy this book on a Friday, you'll be better at your job by Monday, assuming you read the book over the weekend.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
But the idea is that we don't want people to feel like they have to wait forever. for change. And, you know, we don't ask people in this book to go get a PhD or to go move across the country and start a new job. That's not what we're preaching or asking. We try to find suggestions here that are easily implementable, that are accessible to all, that also normalize that change is hard.
Chief Change Officer
#322 Adaira Landry MD: From Mentorship to Micro Skills—Tools for Thriving at Work — Part Two
We talk a lot about why the stuff we're recommending for you to do won't be easy and wasn't easy for us as well. So we understand that change is challenging. But the idea is that we don't want you to feel like you have to wait for life to be better.