Achieving Organizational Excellence is Possible by Promoting Employee Health and Mindfulness

Good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening. This is Jeffrey m Roach, and I am so excited to be here with you with another episode of the holistic leadership podcast. We are so excited today to have with us another highly respected guest. Doctor Richard Safir is a leader in the employee health and well-being field. His work has been featured by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, and he's been quoted in the Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, and Fortune Magazine. Doctor Safir currently serves as the chief medical director of employee health and well-being for Johns Hopkins Medicine, where he leads the Healthy at Hopkins employee health and well-being strategy. He is also the author of A Cure for the Common Company, a well-being prescription for a happier, healthier, and more resilient workforce. Rich is a board certified in three medical specialties, a fellow in three medical colleges, and has been recognized by a former Maryland governor for his contribution to the state public health system. Rich loves being out active outdoors, has hiked and camped in Australia, Alaska, and the Andes among other great outdoor areas of the world. He and his wife are celebrating their twenty sixth wedding anniversary this September, and they are fortunate to have three healthy children. Rich, it's so wonderful, to have you here on the holistic leadership podcast. So excited to dive in with you, really to, talk about your book and the work that you've done, and certainly, to hear from you on why these matters are so important, both as a clinician, but also, as a leader. So so happy to have you here. And I'm happy to be with you, Jeffrey. Just watching your work through the LinkedIn platform and this, podcast, I I think we share a lot of the same values. Yeah. Absolutely. So I wanna I wanna ask you, you know, first and foremost, you know, obviously, the role that you're in professionally, you know, is not necessarily a role that's been around that long, in the field of medicine and even in the health system space. I can remember back in my days, we always had employee health. You know, certainly, we had physician leaders in employee health, but but the focus that you have talk to us a little bit, you know, about what drove you, to do that work, you know, etcetera. Yeah. I mean, it it is definitely a focus, and I would agree with you that the majority of employers have not been focusing on this area. I do have to give credit to Johnson and Johnson and and DuPont because back in the the seventies, fifty fifty years ago already, they did start to expand their idea of employee health and well-being to include the well-being and the prevention part. So, thank you to them to, for for spearheading our our path. I was a family doctor, for a year when I started feeling exhausted, like I wasn't making a difference, and there had to be a better way. I was going between patient rooms every fifteen minutes feeling like, hey. I'm I really don't have enough time to make a big difference for them. And my patients were coming to the office from work and then running back to work, and so there's all this busyness. And I I realized all of a sudden, you know, they're only with me for fifteen minutes, but they're in the workplace for almost two thousand hours a year. If I was in their workplace, that's where I can make a big difference. So from there, Jeffrey, I I started to make my my transition. I didn't realize I'd end up at Hopkins, but I I'm thrilled that I am. That's such an insightful point. Right? Because, you know, now you certainly are in a role where you're also influencing this. And I'm I'm curious to you know, for you to kinda talk about it from a clinician standpoint. Right? Because even just recently, I think I think, the former, former president of the American Medical Association, who's actually been a guest on here, doctor Jesse Ehrenfeld, was in multiple articles where he highlighted that, you know, frankly, we're at probably the worst time we've ever had in terms of physician burnout. Believe it. And also, you know, employee burnout, in health care too. Your thoughts on on what we need to be doing within the health care system to really change that, and and, you know, I'm sure it of relates to your book, which we'll get into as well. But your thoughts on that? So so trying to focus just on the health care system, I I want to pull in the role of the employer in the health care system. So we have, like, you know, more than a hundred million, probably close to a hundred and seventy million, Americans are now insured through their employer. And that means their employer is paying ultimately for their health care, and most employers don't recognize that eighty percent of chronic disease is preventable. It's preventable if we are able to make healthy choices and foster healthy emotions so that we're not only physically healthy, but mentally healthy. And and that's actually a pretty tall order because our health, both mental and physical health, is impacted by our social connections, our financial wherewithal, the cultures and communities in which we live. That doesn't mean that employers should just throw their hands up and keep paying the medical bills. It means that employers have the opportunity to be part of the solution beyond just paying the check. So Mhmm. The role of the health care system is to make sure that there are physicians who are adequately trained and reimbursed to help individuals recognize and build the skills that they need to make those healthier choices and to put a curb on the number of tests and prescriptions that we're having to write. Because all that money that's going in that direction is money that we're not using to help keep each other healthy and well. Yeah. I wanna, you know, unpack that a bit. When you were, particularly in medical school training residency, you know, just out of curiosity, how much do you remember was a focus on, you know, these topics? So, Jeffrey, I I got my bachelor's of science in nutrition, and, I was acutely aware going into medical school, that that was a rarity, and I was an oddity going to school with my my classmates. And I so yearned for the nutrition curriculum as as part of our medical education. And what it boiled down to in the four years was two hours of nutrition that was centered on the biochemical pathways of vitamins. And Uh-huh. I think it said a lot about the state of, medical education at the time, and I knew that this was a problem. I knew it was a problem before I got to medical school because during my nutrition education, I came to realize very quickly, like, hey. This is stuff we should be learning as kids, like in elementary school, and what parents should know. Because otherwise, we're paying catch up when we become adults. You know, it's it's really interesting as you probably know, here on on this show, we also talk a lot about, you know, the the impact of culture, certainly the impact of leaders and sort of the the way that we create, you know, within the organizations, also how that, certainly can impact, emotional health, mental health, well-being. You know, I'm curious in your experience, particularly, you know, in in in this work. You know, there's been a heightened awareness of the importance of this, you know, which is certainly a positive. But at the same time, it's very clear that the data suggests we're gonna have to do some things very, very differently and very quickly if we are to truly address it globally. Your thoughts on, you know, what we should be thinking about, at the organizational level to really make sure we have psychological health and safe environments, that also contribute to one's health. Yeah. I mean, Jeffrey, you mentioned two of the pivotal pieces that are often missing, and that is addressing the workplace culture and the role of the leader in supporting the health and well-being of the people they lead. And, you know, in in my perspective, the culture is the whole pot. And this idea of leadership engagement and well-being is is in that pot. But, you know, the soup just isn't gonna taste right if that ingredient of the leadership engagement is not there. Now, you've had other guests on this podcast who've talked about culture. Just from my perspective, a culture is the shared behaviors, beliefs, and attitudes of a group of people that has something in common. So in the workplace, that commonality is that y'all work for the same organization. And, you know, a lot of employers, genuinely believe they're doing the right thing by offering programs, portals, and prizes. But that doesn't necessarily amount to the perception of the employee knowing that their organization has a shared behavior, belief, and attitude that employee health and well-being is at the top of the priority list. And it and it takes some nuances and and some some specific, approaches that are they they don't usually get a whole lot of attention because they're they're not big moneymakers for, the the the I I I'm sorry. I don't wanna get too editorial here, but let's just face it. Some things get a lot of marketing dollars and some things don't. And so even the idea of well-being being a priority and the appropriate use of priority for organizations, there's no marketing dollars behind it. So it's a good idea. Yeah. It comes up. People agree, and then they forget that they actually need to stick with the concepts of how to prioritize. Which is such an important point. Right? I mean, there's a a great learning moment for all of us. You know, at the end of the day, this should be a top priority for every leader and for every organization because literally lives Yeah. End on it, especially in health. Yeah. And so I wanna I wanna talk about your book. Okay. You know, I think, you know, fascinating, title. I like it. Yeah. Because, obviously, you know, I I love the idea of, you know, a cure, for the common company. And, you know, I wanna ask you, you know, what made you write the book? Yeah. And what was your dream with it? You know, what did you hope Yeah. To have it help to achieve? So I, pivoted early in my career, on a trajectory to to be where I am today, supporting the health and well-being of a workforce. When I got to Hopkins, twelve years ago and I started to do my my work to transform the organization, about three months in, I started to keep a journal because I just had a feeling these pieces were gonna come into place. And so at the time that I started the journal, I thought, you know, one day I'm gonna write the story about how Hopkins got healthy, which is kind of ironic. Right? Because the world knows us from providing health care. But yet at the time, we really weren't doing a great job of caring for each other, caring for our own workforce, and we have come leaps and bounds. And so around two thousand and twenty one, when we were kinda grounded, I I said, you know, it's kinda time to brush off my notes and and to begin to put these pieces in place. I I hope I look younger than I am, but I am, you know, much closer to the end of my career than I am at the beginning of my career. And, Jeffrey, because of the different steps along my path to reach where I am today, brought me a unique combination of skills, experiences, and education. I think that I have something to add to the conversation, and I want others to be able to take advantage of what I believe to be a genuine path, a recipe, or as the book says, a prescription, to help their own workforce, help their own team. And that's how I came to write the book. So, obviously, I'm sure this is in the book. But if you were, you know, if you were, you know, say speaking or or, you know, conversing with another health care system, You know, recognizing that chronic stress is through the roof. Retention is, you know, generally at its worst levels in health care. Supply and demand is not good, in terms of the workforce. What we hear is a lot of people say resilience, which, know, you will regularly hear me say. Anytime I hear someone say resilience, I say that's that's almost like that's almost like putting up something fake because, I I I regularly say as somebody that started my career in health care, I've never met somebody in health care that's not resilient. But but you can only be resilient so long correct. If the culture is so bad. Right? And so I'm curious, you know, in in this kind of element, how do you help leaders to your earlier point, particularly in health care, kind of practice and walk, you know, talk the talk and walk the walk? Because it is the biggest issue, and our patients also are impacted by it too when our workforce is impacted. How do you really get them to prioritize and and really, you know, create that culture as you talk about in your book, that that really is the best that it can be. Yeah. Well, I'd say that, every organization has their own situation. And while I'll share what I believe to be one of the earliest steps, if not the earliest step, I I just wanna everybody understand that it doesn't mean that it necessarily has to be the way that your organization approaches this. Jeffrey, I strongly believe that until organizations work well-being into their strategic plan and include it amongst the annual goals and a long term strategic plan, that, organizational change will most likely not succeed for very long. And so, in my opinion, organizations need to include it in that long term plan, break it out into annual plans, and create annual metrics that every leader is accountable for and have that, trickle down to leaders at all levels so everybody's collectively accountable for. Now in health care in particular, we measure patient safety. We measure finance. We measure the number of beds that are full. We need to be regularly assessing whatever well-being metrics for our workforce that we we've chosen. Because without that, I'm afraid that what's gonna happen is there's gonna be a little blip on the screen, and then it's gonna go away. And to your point, you can't just you can't just measure it with employee engagement surveys, which frankly, you know, also have some challenges. Right? Because many people don't always find them to be anonymous. Yeah. And so there really has to be a strong commitment to have those indicators. You know, I noticed, as I was preparing, to the for this conversation with you that you had also, developed what you call a culture of health framework, which I found, you know, very, very fascinating. I wanna ask you if you can kinda talk a little bit through that, you know, from the vantage point of, you know, as as you think about that framework for the workplace, what does that look like? Sure. You know, many organizations who are in the business of supporting the health and well-being of their workforce, they will choose different types of well-being, like physical well-being, mental well-being, financial well-being, and I'm all for all kinds of well-being. That's not the framework that I'm providing. The framework I'm providing is to how to make your ideas work, how to bring them to life. There are a lot of, social sciences that employers are not taking advantage of, which constitute this framework that I've offered. So it's six building blocks. I can run through them, Jeffrey, if you if you want. I'm just gonna Yeah. Okay. Well, I'll I'll run through them then. And I'll try to make it brief, but I'll I'll give an example of the first one, then I'll withhold examples for the others. And if you wanna pursue them, that's fine. So the six building blocks, the first one is peer support. And by the way, I I they don't have to be in this order. You can do any of them. I suggest that the organizations do as many as possible. Peer support. We are all influenced by the people around us, whether it's our coworker or someone we live with at home or our friend outside, in the community. We are influenced by the the people that we're closest to more than we realize, And yet the data's quite clear that when we are with a friend, a coworker, or a family member who exercises, we're more likely to exercise. Same with eating more healthy, same with quitting smoking, etcetera. Most employers are are are not taking advantage of this. Create opportunities where it's easy for your employees to work together to support each other physically, socially, mentally, etcetera, and you will have more success of reaching a better or a higher level of workplace culture. So there's, I'm I'm gonna give you a phrase, plan for success, and I'll tell you why I I said that phrase because some of the letters are the first letter in the building blocks. So the p is for peer support, the p in plan. The l in plan is for leadership engagement. The n Mhmm. Is for norms. The power of group, the the power of group behavior. Plan for success. The first s in success is for shared values. Companies have values. I'm talking about shared values that are both between leadership and the workforce. The two c's in the middle of success are for culture connection points. These are the different ways that a leader can intentionally nudge the workforce and make it easier to make a healthier choice and easier to have a more positive emotion. And then the last s is for social climate. It's akin to, like, the, the morale of the workforce. Interesting. And I'm curious. This model, is this a model then that you actually have have deployed at Hopkins or have deployed another? Interesting. And and when you think about, you know, obviously, the to your earlier comment on measurement, from the time it was implemented to where we are today, that's also measured? We do measure. We have a culture of health survey that we've done for I I think this might be the eighth year, Jeffrey. And we have two questions for each well-being culture building block, and, that's twelve. We have a third party who delivers it, so there's some anonymity to your point. We want our employees to feel comfortable so that they'll, participate. And Hopkins is a big organization. So while we have aggregate results, we also have results for certain campuses so that we can identify, specific issues for certain parts of the organization. That's awesome. It's, you know, it's definitely to your point. As I as I looked at that model, what spoke to me, frankly, was it's very human centered, which in many ways, you know, I think of the work of the Gold Foundation, you know, which is to always remind us of humanity and health care. And, we have got to bring those types of things into health care because there's a reason health care starts with an age. Right? It's all about humanity. And yet I think in some ways, we've forgotten that element, far too often. I wanna talk a little bit about, you know, I was reading a a story that you were part of, last year, and there was a really interesting tidbit that you had shared about the most interesting story that you, ever faced. And, just to kinda bring back your memory on it, you it was it was roughly about, when you first started your job at Hopkins. I wanted I wanted you to share that here because I was reading those. That that is fascinating. That also just shows the commitment you have, not just to this work, but to Yeah. Well, thank you. It's a fun story. But an opening lesson, I think, for anybody is to pause and observe what's going on around you before you jump in with a plan to support your team or your whole organization depending on where you rest. Mhmm. And so, Jeffrey, like any other job, you know, it takes months to feel settled, especially at a large organizations. But I I did get to a point where it was time for me to to observe what was going on around me. And I went to our flagship hospital one day, and, it's funny. I I had an iPad at the time. I didn't have an iPhone. I used my iPad to take pictures. And I just walked around, looked, and, was trying to figure out what what did the surroundings tell me about, Johns Hopkins as an employer? And I was, like, really deep in thought. Like, how am I gonna address this, world class organization, and and bring something up to them that might be painful for them to to hear? And, at some point, I paused, and I'm like, you know, I saw something out of the corner of my eye, something big and red. What was that? I looked over my my shoulder, and I I saw a big red truck. And, I'm like, oh, okay. There's a fire truck there. That's fine. And I turned, and I I literally only took two more steps. I'm like, hold on a second. That was not a fire truck. And I turned again, and I just looked at it. It was the biggest soda truck I had ever seen. And I just paused, and I'm like, well, that's odd. That's really bizarre to me. It's parked outside of our building. And then I just stood there and and just kinda thought about what that meant. And while I was there, I saw a sign, hanging from the building, that was in next to where the truck was parked, and it was an e, just an e. I'm like, what is an e doing there? And I realized this was the old emergency room entrance that had been turned into a loading dock because ten, twelve years ago, there was a a remodeling done, more than a remodeling. Two huge beautiful towers were put up. And so, I mean, that was the irony for me. I'm like, how, you know, how can we be doing this? We're we're not even seeing one of the greatest contributors to, you know, illness and disease, which is sugary beverages. And and then I I ran with that. Interesting. Wow. Wow. And, obviously, in that work, got them all got got sugary beverages eliminated. Right? Well, not eliminated. We made some substantial changes to make healthier choices the preferred choice. Now so, Jeffrey, this is, this is, like, the challenge, which I think most people don't appreciate how complicated and difficult it is to to have an effective employee health and well-being strategy. Is that, you know, you you nobody wants to be told what to do. I mean, everybody I've met, nobody wants to be told what to do, especially when it comes to their health and well-being. And so you can still get a sugary beverage inside Hopkins. It's just that there are more choices for healthy beverages. The healthy beverages are more visible. They cost less, and we even put, like, a green leaf in front of them as a prompt to help people realize, yeah, this is the healthier choice. Right. Because it was a matter of reeducation. I mean, we're so, overwhelmed by marketing that, most Americans are are kind of at a loss as to what's healthy. To to be to be honest, we're just overwhelmed with marketing now. Yep. I yep. That's so true. That's a great, great story and and obviously kinda paints the picture of why we have to be so engaged and and involved here. Right? I wanna you know, in the same article, you you, certainly also talked a lot about how important it is for for those of us, especially in health care, but but society to to to really take time, you know, relax, really recharge. You know, health care is a space where it's tough to do. You know, generally generally, like, you know, even though they're taking care of other people, they're not always able and don't get the opportunity to take care of themselves. You had shared, though, in there your, your favorite life lesson, end quote. And I thought it would be poignant, for you to talk a little bit about that here too as it relates to to this topic because it it it kinda stood out to me as I was preparing. You're gonna have to remind me why my favorite life I mean, it's I'm a little bit embarrassed to ask for a reminder, but, you know, I I'd hate to guess and have you tell me it was something else later. Yeah. You you said the word breach Yeah. Which, you know, really, really stood out to me. Glad that's what it was. Now because what I would have answered had you not, told me specifically, my my greatest life lesson is the power of mindfulness. And breathing is such an easy way to bring mindfulness into your workday that when I finally, not just discovered it, but embraced it, it it's really been a, transformational part of my life. So, Jeffrey, I I started doing yoga twenty six years ago. And, you know, for anyone who does yoga, those first few minutes and the few at the end and even yoga itself is a form of mindfulness. But what I could not get my head wrapped around was this idea of sitting and meditating. And I tried many different ways. I tried many different instructors. I read about it. I read the scientific articles to show the effectiveness of mindfulness. I knew it was something that was important, but I couldn't embrace it until I went to a five day mindfulness retreat, and it was transformational in my life. And I did that probably seven or eight years ago. And, Jeffrey, after that, once I knew the power of it, I started to work mindfulness into the employee health and well-being strategy at Johns Hopkins Medicine. And, specifically, we are intentional about not only reminding our employees to breathe, but teaching them different breathing techniques and putting cues in place in our work environment to to remind people to breathe. It's really, and and our community is embracing it. It's amazing. Johns Hopkins Medicine, you know, a a highly regarded Western medicine institution is embracing Eastern medicine practices for our employees. That is super interesting. I can remember back in the day at my former health care system when we rolled out, you know, complimentary and alternative medicine program. I always say it was amazing the type of feedback we got from from not not just, ironically, it was less from the medical staff, but more from the community. You know, I can remember we had, you know, we had Acupuncture, and we had, you know, different different, services. We we even had, rates. It's great. Which was a tremendous benefit both for staff and also for our patients and particularly our cancer patients. But I will never forget, a pastor, of a church in the community who actually went to the newspaper and, chastised our medical center for what he called, you know, us participating in devil like behavior. And I will never, if you know, to this day, I kinda smile. I didn't smile then, but I smile now because our CEO at the time was I always called her, like, mother Teresa of health care. She was a nurse, you know, that grew up in leadership, forty plus years of health care, one of the best leaders I ever had the privilege to learn and serve with. And I'll never forget, I get the call in the morning as soon as, you know, she saw the paper, up to her office. And she looks to me, and she says, get this pastor on the phone. She he get this pastor on the phone. I said, are you sure? She said, you better believe it. And, she said, if he thinks he's gonna do this to me, this this little girl who went to Catholic school all her life is gonna teach him a thing or two about what it's like to heal people and to help them feel better. And, and I will never forget. We did. And I will never forget the conversation and, and, and how well she delivered to this pastor, sort of that cake right to him, because she made sure that he understood that, he was wrong. And she reminded him that not only was he so wrong, but that he should have come to her first because biblically Wow. You always address, you know, the issue with the person first. And she went line by line by line. And I'll never forget the last line she said. And she said, in health care, we're to heal. She said, sometimes we can't heal everything, but we can certainly do our best to make them be as comfortable in the process. And if you are somebody who believes in helping people, how dare you run to a newspaper and challenge us in that process? Wow. And I'll never forget the moment I sat back and was like, you know, wow. And, you know, to your point, it made me think of that because, I think in times in medicine, to your point on issues like meditation, mindfulness, you know, some of these other things, we have we have, we've knocked it before we've tried it. We haven't taken the time to see the benefits to people. We haven't taken the time to say, hey. Let them try it. Let them do it. And if it helps, it's gonna help all of us. And so certainly wanna thank you for your leadership and, and certainly for leading that type of change because, obviously, I can only imagine how many employees have been been been have benefited, but also how many patients have benefited because we know that ripple effect is is perfect. Yes. No. At first, you know, I can understand why you relish the time with that leader. Now there's an example of a leader who truly embraced her opportunity to support well-being within her institution. So that that's great. And thank you. I it is an honor to serve the employees, of Johns Hopkins Medicine, and it's also a privilege to know that when we have a healthier more well workforce, that translates into better patient care. Mhmm. Absolutely. Rich, I wanna ask you, you know, we're coming up on time. I wanna ask you, where can individuals connect with you, learn more about your book? Where can they be you, where can individuals connect with you, learn more about your book? Where can they be directed? Thank you. So I'm on LinkedIn. You can also learn more about my work at richard saphir dot com. If you can spell my name, then you can find my website. The book is available, I think, at most places where you buy books, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, etcetera. I hope people will will take a read, A Cure for the Common Company. I promise you there's other great things about the book, not just the title. Jeffrey, thank you so much for including me today on your podcast. You're so welcome, and it's it's, truly wonderful to to have you here. And, for all of our guests, check out, Rich's work, check out the book, and certainly, think about as he shared here today, how we as leaders can truly not just embrace it, but actually implement it. And so, Rich, thank you for your transformative work.