Becker Private Equity & Business Podcast
Loren Deutsch on Transforming Education, Healthcare, and Leadership Coaching 1-24-25
Fri, 24 Jan
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In this episode, Loren Deutsch, Founder and Executive Director of Loren Academic Services, Inc., shares her journey, the mission to foster diversity and inclusion, and the innovative coaching models she has developed to support academic success, career growth, and medical education.
Chapter 1: What services does Loren Deutsch provide?
Sure. So we the title of the company is Lauren Academic Services, and it is divided now into three areas pretty broadly. One is in the area of career coaching and the others in the area of sort of academic coaching in general education. And the third is in the area of medical education. So medical coaching. And that's and I can go into each of them.
But those three broad areas are what we have focused on now for the past roughly 15 years, and before that, I did that obviously independently before I started the company, but that's where we are today. And our main focus is really looking at where people may get stuck for a variety of reasons in their learning.
Chapter 2: What is Loren's mission in education and coaching?
But the mission within our company, I think, is probably the bigger part of what we do, and that is to foster diversity, inclusion, equitable representation, and so forth. And that is that is literally within our mission statement. And that has been the focus for all 15 years. So thank you.
And how did you get started in this? You do remarkable work. And how did you get started in this?
Sure. So long ago, as a great graduate student at the University of Chicago, I asked a research question, which is something we often do when we want to get funded for a job. And so but not not only for that reason, obviously, I was interested in why I was seeing a significant number of medical students and residents coming in.
to the the student counseling services and asking for support that sounded a little bit like they needed academic support but also other things and we didn't really have a defined program at the time and so I sat down and wrote a proposal to the director and came up with an idea to look at where medical students and residents needed more support, but it wasn't really tutoring kind of support.
Chapter 3: How did Loren Deutsch start her journey in education?
It had a lot of those elements, but it was more around looking at organization and just the crossover of, you know, the competing demands for time and how they are contending with those demands, and then how they're being trained within those demands, and then accessing all the resources that we might need or they might need, you know, anyone would.
as they're going through kind of their lives, the early part of career physicians, as well as into, you know, attendings and so forth, where things get stuck or get jumbled or get more complex.
Thank you. And take a moment. You've moved from Chicago to Northern California. Do you miss the weather in Chicago? Do you miss the winters?
Not even a little bit, Scott. I don't think I miss them at all. I love the winters. I mean, I love winter. I moved here so that I would actually have more access to being outdoors and skiing and hiking and biking and so forth. And I love the winters here. So, no, we get maybe a lot more snow than in Chicago. But I think right now you guys might be outpacing us. So I'm not sure.
Chapter 4: What are the challenges faced by medical students?
There you go. So either way, great. And talk about what you're most focused on and excited about this year.
Yeah, I think there's probably a few different areas. I have been recently attending podcasts and meetings for docs with disabilities. A lot of the work that I do started out in education, just in general education, and looking at learning disabilities, attention deficits, and thinking about the impact
that they have and what are the ways in which we, you know, develop strategies and so forth around that. And so, as an educator, that's been a long, you know, long-term interest. And so, Docs with Disabilities, I think, has been a phenomenal contribution. It's something you guys should look into because I think you would love to interview Lisa Meeks. She's heading that up.
I think she's at University of Michigan and working in, you know, heading up her own learning lab there. So that would be one area. I think another area, you know, that is important in Year in Dare is I do a lot of writing and presenting. So this year earlier, I was presenting at GRIT, which was a Mayo Clinic conference. It actually was held not too far from my home here in Tahoe.
Chapter 5: Why did Loren move from Chicago to Northern California?
So I got an opportunity to talk a lot about what we do on a coaching model and kind of what that looks like. Our model is based on a systems-based approach, and it is a time-limited approach. model.
So we're really looking at how do you take information over a certain amount of years of metrics and say, well, that sort of tells us what we can predict will happen if we do X, Y, and Z. And so we did a lot of that and compiled the metrics over time. And I got to present that at this conference, which was really exciting for me.
Yeah, that's fascinating. And And how did you start the business you started? Talk a bit about, was that an anxious time? Was it an exciting time? How do you think about that?
Chapter 6: What is Loren excited about in her current work?
I think it felt very natural. I think that when you go into business for yourself, some people maybe feel like that's going to be scary or worrisome or whatever. I fully embraced it. I went all in right at the start. And I think... Figuring out what a financial model should look like for a company like mine, you know, I kind of grappled with whether it should be for profit or nonprofit.
That was one question. Thinking about the model that I had designed at UChicago and how I would incorporate that into a business and then use that in other ways within the business, that became a really compelling and exciting time. And for me, it's about sort of each one teach one. So I like the idea of teaching that to other people and pushing it forward.
And, you know, as scary as it might sound to kind of supply your competitors, maybe, with more and more and more information, I feel like there should be a lot of us in this arena. The need is there. The demand is there. So I think I started talking about emotions and learning long ago and learning disabilities and attention deficits long ago.
And now I'm seeing that, you know, a lot of the campuses and medical centers where we work They are hiring full-time people to do essentially what we would provide as external vendors and stuff. But I don't think that's diminished the opportunity. I think it's maybe altered it slightly, but I don't think in any way diminished. So you did ask one other question.
I can pause, but there is one other piece, I think, within that, which is sort of the what are we seeing today, what's trending today versus what we're seeing today.
Yeah, so a few years ago, I think when we first talked on this program, you know, I was seeing a lot of more of the sort of learning disabilities diagnosed or subclinical and things like that that program directors, deans, et cetera, would reach out and say, I have a student or I have a certain number of students who need support in this area.
What we're finding now is actually more in graduate medical education around early career physicians who are kind of struggling with professionalism, struggling with communication, struggling with some of the ACGME standards and really grappling with that. So they... They know how to learn. They know how to take tests. They know how to do those things, perhaps quite well.
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Chapter 7: How does Loren's coaching model work?
But, you know, as we know, the ACGME has standards for how we teach physicians and early career physicians need to develop their core competencies around that. I think we're seeing an uptick in where that's become more challenging. And so, I'm really intrigued by it, and obviously, I think it goes to a lot of what we would expect from doctors and physicians today, which is bedside manner,
being able to communicate, you know, being able to kind of cross over different sectors and segments, you know, and so forth as they're either teaching or treating patients. So to me, that's a really neat area of opportunity for LAS, but it's a really important area, I think, within our healthcare system as well.
Talk for a moment about what you're seeing in terms of diversity in the healthcare workforce, in the physician roles. What are you seeing in terms of diversity?
Yeah, well, I mean, our focus has always been on a more diverse, you know, population of physicians. So we've always worked really within that area. I don't want to say exclusively, but that has been long been the focus. I think it's getting more attention right now for all kinds of reasons. In the political, you know, area, we have changing presidents, obviously, just occurred yesterday.
But with that, I think we're going to see It appears we will continue to see, unfortunately, probably lack or limited opportunities in terms of the same kind of representation. And so I think there are barriers that still exist that we as educators really do need to be aware of and open to and how we kind of push forward and say, no, this is intolerable or this is not OK.
And, you know, depending on where people's political views are, and I realize that that varies. You know, we've seen an impact due to affirmative action. We've seen an impact due to some of the other kind of policies that have gotten overturned or shifted. So not to politicize it, but to me, that is such an important focus. I think there are still... There is still a dearth of...
of representation or areas where we see representation. And that does sometimes vary by specialty, but it's a question of, are we seeing the equal numbers of men and women entering? Are we seeing equal numbers of, you know, racial diversity or socioeconomic diversity or first-generation educated diversity? And the answer is, no, we aren't. And I, to me, that feels still vitally important.
And it always will. And I think that will always be my focus.
No, thank you very much. It's a fascinating subject because at the end of the day, we're dealing with two shortages. One, an overall shortage in the workforce of physicians and nurses and all kinds of health practitioners. And second, underrepresentation of minorities and so forth.
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Chapter 8: What are the trends in education and coaching today?
You just seem to love what you do and care about it deeply. But talk about that as a foundation for business, too.
Yeah, I mean, I think advice for founders, one is don't be afraid to take risks and don't be afraid to fall down. I mean, truly, I don't mean to suggest that anybody wants to embrace failure, but I do think that that is sometimes a component of working in business and being an entrepreneur is that you sometimes throw ideas out there and you work on them really, really hard.
And then sometimes they don't convert in the ways that you think they might. So I think that is one element of it. I think another part, I mean, to me, the best advice that I think I was given at the very, very beginning was probably twofold. One was make sure your financial model is sound, and two, make sure that you track your metrics. Make sure you can say why what you do works.
Show that it can work empirically. And so that's always been, for me, like, two really driving aspects of my, you know, of my company. I think, by far and away, we understand our financial model, we know how it works, and we use that to make really informed decisions financially. I don't... It's not all just whimsical and ephemeral.
It's... A lot of it is, ah, let me put some thought into this, let me do the calculus, make sure that this is actually a financially viable... you know, direction to move in. I think the other would be the empirical piece, tracking the progress that we've made and showing empirically that what we do works.
And here, we know these ingredients go into our model, and we know that when we pull those out, we don't see the same types of outcomes. And so making sure we can communicate that to, you know, to our clients and making sure that they understand why we do the things that we do or why we do something the way we do. So I think those would be two big pieces. And then obviously the listening part.
You know, at the end of the day, we have to communicate well, but we have to listen. So we have to sort of get a pulse on what's going on, you know, what's going on out there, what's happening within medicine or what's happening within general education, what's happening within executive coaching and career coaching. And, you know, that part is vital. We have to listen to what people tell us.
And, you know, when they come in as clients, we can't just say, well, do it my way, you know, and that'll work. We say... So let me hear your story and let me understand where you are and then what your expectations are. And then we can kind of collaborate in building out a plan to work.
Lauren, I want to thank you again for joining us on the Becker Private Equity and Business Podcast. I just love the passion you bring to what you do. It makes you a special leader, a special person. Thank you so much for joining us today.
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