Colleagues discuss the importance of caring for spiritual well-being of staff
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In this "Mayo Clinic Employee Experiences" conversation, Pamala Riess and Corinne Thul discuss their experiences in caring for the spiritual well-being of Mayo's staff.
Mayo Clinic is a unique place: the culture, the values, the people. "Mayo Clinic Employee Experiences" explores the experiences of Mayo Clinic staff as they navigate life personally and professionally. Sharing these experiences increases understanding of others and ultimately contributes to finding connections, belonging and inclusion at work.
In this episode of "Mayo Clinic Employee Experiences," Corinne Thul, a chaplain, and Pamala Riess, a nurse manager, discuss their experiences in caring for the spiritual well-being of Mayo's staff.
Thul is passionate about working with staff to enhance their spiritual well-being through programs offered by the Chaplain team. These programs allow staff to reflect and understand the importance of caring for themselves so that they can be ready to care for patients. Riess shares a similar perspective as a nurse manager, emphasizing the need to care for her team by incorporating these programs into their professional development days for her staff to experience.
Listen as Thul and Reiss share their experiences:
Read the transcript
Narrator: This is the "Mayo Clinic Employee Experiences" podcast, where we build trust and belonging through the authentic storytelling of our Mayo Clinic staff. In this episode, you will hear Corinne, a chaplain, and Pamala, a nurse manager, discuss the importance of caring for our staff's spiritual well-being.
Thul: I'm a chaplain here at Mayo Clinic in Rochester. I have a unique opportunity not just to visit patients and care for patients and their families, but half of my FTE is dedicated specifically to staff care. I absolutely love the support that I get to give staff day in and day out.
Some of the interventions we do are called "Support Our Staff," or SOS, where we bring a whole bin of goodies and printed resources and leave it for staff.
There's "Tea for the Soul," where I and sometimes another chaplain bring a cart with tea and hot water for tea, and pastries. But the special sauce that chaplains bring is the reflective piece. We do something with letting go, a gratitude wall or self-compassion exercise or the four pebbles meditation ,and it's really lovely.
Riess: I'm a nurse manager on Gonda 12. We support Otolaryngology — Head and Neck Surgery. My role is to primarily oversee the daily operations of our nursing and procedural support assistant teams, ensuring the highest quality of patient care possible. Additionally, I also get opportunities along with my other nursing leadership team members to lead staff in well-being sessions each year. This is something that I really look forward to planning with my team. We call them Professional Development Days.
If we continue to prioritize our staff well-being, we demonstrate our commitment to respect and compassion for our teams.
Corinne Thul, a chaplain
This year, we aimed to promote mental, emotional and physical health among our team members. We've gone through a lot of changes, and it was important that our team felt supported in all those areas. This year's session was designed to provide the support, resources and strategies for managing stress and maintaining a healthy work-life balance. And we're trying to support our teams as a leadership team.
Thul: I love how much you pour your heart out in caring for your staff, Pamala. It's so meaningful to me to participate in the care of staff. Everybody who works here has a real concern for others, has a beautiful heart of compassion and wants to serve the needs of the patient first. But they're not always so good at caring for themselves. When I get to be with staff and remind them that it's not just OK, but it's vitally important that they care for themselves, receive care from one another, and that other aspects of Mayo, like the chaplains, are here and can provide support. That is a reminder of how important being cared for and caring for yourself truly is.
Riess: That's great, Corinne. And it was so great to connect with you to have you help support our Professional Development Day. I went into a leadership role because I wanted to make people feel supported and to really help them. I feel strongly that if our team members don't feel supported, then it can directly impact the quality of care we provide to our patients. If we're not taking care of ourselves, we can't be our best selves for our patients either. I truly feel that it starts with their leadership team, their peers and inviting wonderful people like you to help support them through these situations each day.
Thul: It's so exciting to hear you say that, Pamala. When I think about the staff care that we do, I get to partner with nurse leaders and other nursing leadership teams. It embodies all of our Mayo Clinic values. When we are caring for staff, they feel so respected.
Caring for staff is caring for the institution and that can just boost integrity. Of course, it's all about compassion and healing. The teams have such a delightful time interacting during our sessions.
It feels like it builds up that teamwork and I get to do some innovative things. I've had staff members say, "Corinne, I would never meditate for anyone else." But they did it for me, so that's pretty nice. We're just taking good care of one another. That's stewardship and all of it together, of course, is helping us to be the best that we can be.
Riess: I agree and caring for our team helps overall with team morale. And that's why I was so excited about our Professional Development Day, especially the activities that you did and like you said, meditation. There are a lot of people who are unfamiliar with the great benefits that it brings to them. It helps everything that encompasses them as an employee. It helps with preventing burnout. It can help improve job satisfaction. And you can tie that into our RICH TIES values.
If we continue to prioritize our staff well-being, we demonstrate our commitment to respect and compassion for our teams. They need to know that we recognize that their health is fundamental to their ability to care for others. We need people like you and others who came and supported our Professional Development Day to help them recognize that.
Thul: If I think about a couple of impactful moments that I've had leading staff well-being sessions, one of them would be when we were doing an exercise — a reflection where people maybe were holding things inside of them that they really ought to let go of. It's not as easy to do as I think it should be, but we need to practice it.
We invite staff to write down whatever they need to let go of and write it on some dissolving paper with the intention of truly letting it go. They drop that paper into some water. They give the water a stir, and it just kind of melts away. It has happened more than once where, as the person stirs the water and sees this thing just disappearing before their eyes, they tear up and are kind of relieved to begin to take a healthier approach for themselves.
It's compassion for self, understanding "I can't carry all of this, and I don't have to."
The other would be with the four pebbles meditation that I teach. It's not mine. It came originally from Thich Nhat Hanh and children at his Plum Village Retreat Center. I'll just talk about the second pebble. The second pebble represents a mountain. Breathing in, the person says, "I see myself as a mountain." Breathing out, the person says, "I feel solid." Then the person just thinks "mountain" on the inhale and "solid" on the exhale for three long breaths.
For so many staff whom I support, sometimes work can be hard. It can break our hearts. They can feel a little bit like Jello inside. But we actually have that solidity. It's a beautiful word. We have the solidity within us that we need. And we can cultivate that. It feels like I'm helping staff to be like a mountain that stands strong. It can have a storm swirling all around it, but it can be solid. And so can our staff.
People find that within themselves and come to work better able to bear some of the emotion that this work can bring. That's been pretty cool to experience staff experiencing my ministry, my support, and these nurturing interventions in ways that they feel are going to practically help them in their lives. That's awesome.
Riess: That is awesome, and I'm so glad that you brought that up. Because when you said, "What was the most impactful thing?" for me that day when you came and visited us during our Professional Development Day, I had two of the same examples.
I remember when staff were choosing their pebbles. They were excited because, even though all the pebbles were completely different, some of them chose very similar ones. It was really interesting to me because all my team members are unique and wonderful in their own ways, but then you see them picking similar pebbles as well.
Another thing that I really thought was impactful was the dissolvable piece of paper with the intention of letting it go. As a leader, I'm aware of the struggles our team faces, whether at work, at home, or probably both, to be honest. My hope during that ceremony of that dissolving paper was even though it was just for that moment writing it on paper, seeing it dissolve, my team would feel that their worries and stress were being acknowledged. Even though we're not sure what they wrote on that paper, I hope my team feels that they weren't alone, that we understand everyone has stressors that they're working on every day and how it can impact life either at work or home, or both. I just hoped that they could, at least for that moment, let go of that particular stressor and try to find some peace with that ceremony. It was such a wonderful activity.
Thul: That's so beautiful. I love that. It's beautiful to hear that.
Riess: Yeah, it was great. I need to give credit to my team. If they hadn't shown up with a positive and engaging attitude, it wouldn't have been successful. They wouldn't have been able to have those moments of peace, been able to try new things, or really dig deep into reflective meditation.
Thul: I think also from the leadership to the staff, you model that, Pamala. You are really helping them feel cared for. It's so clear from your team that they know that you care for them and in a way, we have to do it that way. We have to be Mayo caring for Mayo. I just saw that so much within your team, and that's such a beautiful thing. And then we get to come alongside and give you a boost walking beside you. That's pretty special.
If I could maybe give one encouragement, I would invite you as you're listening here, if you're in a place where you can do this, put both of your hands over your heart and just have the intention. Think to yourself, with everything that's happening in your life, what would be something that you could tell yourself right now to give yourself some self-compassion?
Taking care of yourself at work is not a luxury, but it's a necessity to get your mind away from those stressors.
Pamala Riess, a nurse manager
I'm going to tell you about something in my life, and then I'm going to leave a little bit of silence. In my life, I need to be kinder to my tomorrow self. I don't always have good priorities in the evening. But if I think about what could I do right now — one or two, maybe three little things — I could do that would make Corinne's day better tomorrow. I get a few things done, and my day is so fantastic tomorrow.
Take a moment to think. What could you tell yourself for a little bit of compassion?
Thanks for trying that, everybody. Maybe write yourself a little note to remind yourself of the message that you had for yourself today.
Riess: That's great, Corinne. I think a lot of times, no matter what your role, your title, or your responsibilities in our organization, it's easy to not prioritize ourselves. So, just taking those few moments and remembering that you are a priority is very important.
One thing I like to do is lean on my colleagues who are friends. Knowing that I can go to them to talk through a discussion, talk about my day or walk through a problem is big as a nurse leader. It took me a long time to recognize that I was not burdening them and that they would prefer for me to go talk to them so I don't have that burnout. Even if it's just going for a walk to stretch your legs. If it's been a busy meeting day, taking care of yourself at work is not a luxury, but it's a necessity to get your mind away from those stressors.
Something that I've heard quite often since I started in leadership is that you can't pour from an empty cup. That has really resonated with me this year, especially after our Professional Development Day, where we talked about stressors and the four pebbles. That has really helped me and guided me.
Narrator: Thank you both for sharing your perspectives with us and the passion you bring to the work you are doing in caring for our staff. Sharing stories like these increases our understanding of one another and ultimately contributes to finding connections, belonging and inclusion at work. For more stories, subscribe to "Mayo Clinic Employee Experiences" on popular podcast apps.
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