What Employers Want - What Real People Need
All doors are open to courtesy....Thomas Fuller.
Self-courtesy, as well as courtesy delivered by others, is connected to optimum heath & performance...Elizabeth Bohorquez, RN, C.Ht
A few days ago I decided to approach my blog in a new way. Perhaps it will help my readers to know me better, as well as my work. I am not new to this & have actually been an RN for over 35 years, practicing medical & self-development hypnosis for just about all of those.
I work with & write books, as well as CD programs for two different groups of people; employers/businesses/corporate executives & then the everyone else group. The two groups are very different, having completely separate goals. However, when the employer or corporate executive takes off the business-related hat, they then move to the group of everyone else ,sharing the goals of that group. It's actually quite extraordinary to observe this in a therapeutic setting.....a true Dr. Jeckyl & Mr. Hyde.
Although I worked with these two separate groups through my entire career, their division became more obvious to me in 1983 when I was appointed the Director of Staff Development of a large gero-psychiatric facility in Delmar, New York, just outside Albany, the capital of New York State. My job description included training the staff, as well as reversing the employee turnover, absentee & accident rate that was literally ruining the bottom line of the corporation. I was also asked to enhance the creativity & employee performance at all levels. I also remember being told that it would be an added bonus if people were more civil to each other. It's interesting to note that I was never actually asked to do anything for the employee, but just for the employer. Keep this is mind because it is a very important point & one that shouldn't go unnoticed.
I spent my first few weeks meeting each employee, as well as observing & reviewing the programs already in place. Of course, everyone was on their best behavior, carefully hiding their true selves & secrets. I knew it would take time for the employees to trust me enough to allow me to truly know them, but I had the advantage of being a skilled psych nurse......I was an excellent observer of very small details, some even unknown to the owner.
UNDER THE UMBRELLA
Corporations, big or small, are like families. Most of them are dysfunctional & why shouldn't they be? And it truly isn't a negative thing at all......if everyone is taken under the wing & get's what they need to succeed personally & then can apply this to the workplace.
Think about it for a moment. Each employee was raised by different parents, walking different paths, taking care of themselves or not in different ways, all bringing along their own problems & methods of trying to solve them. Policies & educational programs within corporations are like the basic rules of the family. They are usually always about the over-arching unit & not the individuals. In the workplace, they are usually only about the employer..... the employee expected to fit into them, like a perfect puzzle piece. Little or no consideration is given to the individual needs in order for this to happen. This is a major crux & one that can truly upset the apple cart.
In this particular workplace, the programs or policies were also dysfunctional, as they did not take care of helping the employees to gain the skills or lifestyle behaviors they needed to be good employees under this umbrella. Certainly there was no room for becoming better or excellent. The programs or policies may have looked OK on paper, but they had little to do with what makes employees healthy & able to function at their highest levels & even beyond. They certainly did not build creativity, even for the healthiest employee.
WHAT'S REALLY WRONG
If we look at the number of people in our country who suffer from physical or emotional problems, it becomes easier to understand why corporate life can be so difficult & why there is so much turnover. People are hired on their resumes, with little known about what is going on inside of them. Sometimes it is possible to see some past problems, but certainly not all of them & quite honestly, who is without problems? Certainly no one that I know. In addition, some of the most creative people are beset with problems, many that can be solved by correcting lifestyle behaviors. A smart corporation with good in-house education can truly reap the very best with just a few smart strokes.
As human being, we all pretend at some level. The more problems a person has, the more frequently he/she tends to move. Most of this mobility is not upward, but instead it is on the same level. That person has very special reasons for changing jobs. Everyone, including the problematic person on the move, comes to a new job with the hope that he can have a fresh start & believing that the grass will be greener on this side of the fence, but after several experiences, he does know that this is just a fantasy thought & so he must pretend even more, hoping to hide behind a better designed mask. There is tremendous fear of being found out & so of course, stress levels are quite high. It's interesting to know that 60-80% of diseases are stress-related & if one works or lives in a stress-loaded environment.....well you can do the math. It's no surprise that changing jobs is right at the top of the highest stress producer experiences, quite close to the death of a loved one.
WHAT I FOUND
I was taken aback with how the staff treated each other & as I came to know them, I was able to uncover the plethora of addictions, eating disorders, unhealthy lifestyle behaviors, emotional management issues, poor self-image, self-esteem, lack of confidence & especially lack of hope, all of these connected to the tone of the workplace. To me, the lack of hope was the saddest part. Many of the employees couldn't imagine their lives getting any better than they were & a large percentage truly believed that their life conditions would become worse. This wasn't just among those on the lower rungs of the ladder, although that would have been sad enough. I found it across the board & even into the board room. In nursing we call this the hopeless-helpless downward spiral & it not only causes illness, but it can kill. It can also kill the bottom line in the workplace.
In this particular situation, despite all of this being quite obvious, the employer wanted these very same people to be high achievers, to be creative, to stay healthy, to come to work on time & in other words, to be model employees to foster their bottom line. Talk about being lost in a dream world!
SO WHAT TO DO
I began to design an entire new educational program for all employees. I called this the MindBody Fitness Boot Camp....an attempt to make it a bit more appealing, like giving out lollipops in a doctor's office. I was about to bring in literally hundreds of new things & you know how people love change! I was going to need to get these individuals to be willing to truly look at themselves, to let go of their own self-cruelty & to desire change. For those of you who downloaded the first track of creativity, you have a little idea of one of the magical places I had to build for them.
We are all grown up children, some more mature than others, but most of us less mature than we think we are. Many of these employees were literally starving for some ray of creativity that would lead them to their own authentic selves. I had to help them take off their old belief coats, many that were placed there by other people. They needed new lifestyle behaviors, including healthy eating plans, deep relaxation & they needed tools to teach them how to think in new ways. That is when I designed all of the CD programs that are found on my website & many of which I will share with you.
My purpose is to walk you through a good part of this program & hopefully help some of you. I'm also looking for a publisher, editor or agent or can share this vision with me & help me to take it where it needs to go. One thing I know for sure......I fully intend to find the way.
AFFIRMATION
Never, never give up. People are depending on you....Elizabeth Bohorquez, RN, C.Ht
All doors are open to courtesy....Thomas Fuller.
Self-courtesy, as well as courtesy delivered by others, is connected to optimum heath & performance...Elizabeth Bohorquez, RN, C.Ht
A few days ago I decided to approach my blog in a new way. Perhaps it will help my readers to know me better, as well as my work. I am not new to this & have actually been an RN for over 35 years, practicing medical & self-development hypnosis for just about all of those.
I work with & write books, as well as CD programs for two different groups of people; employers/businesses/corporate executives & then the everyone else group. The two groups are very different, having completely separate goals. However, when the employer or corporate executive takes off the business-related hat, they then move to the group of everyone else ,sharing the goals of that group. It's actually quite extraordinary to observe this in a therapeutic setting.....a true Dr. Jeckyl & Mr. Hyde.
Although I worked with these two separate groups through my entire career, their division became more obvious to me in 1983 when I was appointed the Director of Staff Development of a large gero-psychiatric facility in Delmar, New York, just outside Albany, the capital of New York State. My job description included training the staff, as well as reversing the employee turnover, absentee & accident rate that was literally ruining the bottom line of the corporation. I was also asked to enhance the creativity & employee performance at all levels. I also remember being told that it would be an added bonus if people were more civil to each other. It's interesting to note that I was never actually asked to do anything for the employee, but just for the employer. Keep this is mind because it is a very important point & one that shouldn't go unnoticed.
I spent my first few weeks meeting each employee, as well as observing & reviewing the programs already in place. Of course, everyone was on their best behavior, carefully hiding their true selves & secrets. I knew it would take time for the employees to trust me enough to allow me to truly know them, but I had the advantage of being a skilled psych nurse......I was an excellent observer of very small details, some even unknown to the owner.
UNDER THE UMBRELLA
Corporations, big or small, are like families. Most of them are dysfunctional & why shouldn't they be? And it truly isn't a negative thing at all......if everyone is taken under the wing & get's what they need to succeed personally & then can apply this to the workplace.
Think about it for a moment. Each employee was raised by different parents, walking different paths, taking care of themselves or not in different ways, all bringing along their own problems & methods of trying to solve them. Policies & educational programs within corporations are like the basic rules of the family. They are usually always about the over-arching unit & not the individuals. In the workplace, they are usually only about the employer..... the employee expected to fit into them, like a perfect puzzle piece. Little or no consideration is given to the individual needs in order for this to happen. This is a major crux & one that can truly upset the apple cart.
In this particular workplace, the programs or policies were also dysfunctional, as they did not take care of helping the employees to gain the skills or lifestyle behaviors they needed to be good employees under this umbrella. Certainly there was no room for becoming better or excellent. The programs or policies may have looked OK on paper, but they had little to do with what makes employees healthy & able to function at their highest levels & even beyond. They certainly did not build creativity, even for the healthiest employee.
WHAT'S REALLY WRONG
If we look at the number of people in our country who suffer from physical or emotional problems, it becomes easier to understand why corporate life can be so difficult & why there is so much turnover. People are hired on their resumes, with little known about what is going on inside of them. Sometimes it is possible to see some past problems, but certainly not all of them & quite honestly, who is without problems? Certainly no one that I know. In addition, some of the most creative people are beset with problems, many that can be solved by correcting lifestyle behaviors. A smart corporation with good in-house education can truly reap the very best with just a few smart strokes.
As human being, we all pretend at some level. The more problems a person has, the more frequently he/she tends to move. Most of this mobility is not upward, but instead it is on the same level. That person has very special reasons for changing jobs. Everyone, including the problematic person on the move, comes to a new job with the hope that he can have a fresh start & believing that the grass will be greener on this side of the fence, but after several experiences, he does know that this is just a fantasy thought & so he must pretend even more, hoping to hide behind a better designed mask. There is tremendous fear of being found out & so of course, stress levels are quite high. It's interesting to know that 60-80% of diseases are stress-related & if one works or lives in a stress-loaded environment.....well you can do the math. It's no surprise that changing jobs is right at the top of the highest stress producer experiences, quite close to the death of a loved one.
WHAT I FOUND
I was taken aback with how the staff treated each other & as I came to know them, I was able to uncover the plethora of addictions, eating disorders, unhealthy lifestyle behaviors, emotional management issues, poor self-image, self-esteem, lack of confidence & especially lack of hope, all of these connected to the tone of the workplace. To me, the lack of hope was the saddest part. Many of the employees couldn't imagine their lives getting any better than they were & a large percentage truly believed that their life conditions would become worse. This wasn't just among those on the lower rungs of the ladder, although that would have been sad enough. I found it across the board & even into the board room. In nursing we call this the hopeless-helpless downward spiral & it not only causes illness, but it can kill. It can also kill the bottom line in the workplace.
In this particular situation, despite all of this being quite obvious, the employer wanted these very same people to be high achievers, to be creative, to stay healthy, to come to work on time & in other words, to be model employees to foster their bottom line. Talk about being lost in a dream world!
SO WHAT TO DO
I began to design an entire new educational program for all employees. I called this the MindBody Fitness Boot Camp....an attempt to make it a bit more appealing, like giving out lollipops in a doctor's office. I was about to bring in literally hundreds of new things & you know how people love change! I was going to need to get these individuals to be willing to truly look at themselves, to let go of their own self-cruelty & to desire change. For those of you who downloaded the first track of creativity, you have a little idea of one of the magical places I had to build for them.
We are all grown up children, some more mature than others, but most of us less mature than we think we are. Many of these employees were literally starving for some ray of creativity that would lead them to their own authentic selves. I had to help them take off their old belief coats, many that were placed there by other people. They needed new lifestyle behaviors, including healthy eating plans, deep relaxation & they needed tools to teach them how to think in new ways. That is when I designed all of the CD programs that are found on my website & many of which I will share with you.
My purpose is to walk you through a good part of this program & hopefully help some of you. I'm also looking for a publisher, editor or agent or can share this vision with me & help me to take it where it needs to go. One thing I know for sure......I fully intend to find the way.
AFFIRMATION
Never, never give up. People are depending on you....Elizabeth Bohorquez, RN, C.Ht
posted by ElizRN at 6:23 AM
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