Simply Worth It: Physician Negotiations with Dr. Linda Street

In the thick of heavy emotions or challenging times, the idea of hope feels nebulous and impossible to put into action. Hope isn't an autopilot emotion, but what if we had a framework for it and a process we can follow to push forward?

Whether we're trying to negotiate for our dream job, or navigate difficult situations, what steps can we take to put the concept of hope into action?

In this episode, I'm going to share how to use hope to move ourselves forward.

Three Things You'll Learn In This Episode

- Why hope is necessary

What role does hope play in our negotiations and our jobs?

- Why hope isn't just an emotion

Can we have hope and put it in action when we're feet-on-the-ground realists?

- How to be more open to reroutes and pivots

Is hope possible when we're not 100% sure what the route to our goals looks like?

Autonomy - or lack thereof - is something that comes up a lot when physicians don't feel satisfied in their jobs, but what if we have more agency than we tend to believe?

While there are certainly things we can't control in our jobs, we do have autonomy and the power to choose in many areas. Ultimately, we have a lot of choices and the power to exercise them.

How do we change our perspective on autonomy? In this episode, I'm going to share how to focus on the autonomy we do have.

Three Things You'll Learn In This Episode

- Why we're not powerless

Are there places where we have more direct control than we think?

- The limiting belief that makes us feel powerless

When we believe we have zero autonomy or agency, are we giving our power away?

- How to own your autonomy

How do we start acknowledging and exercising our authority?

It's no secret that a lot of physicians find themselves burnt out and disillusioned with practicing medicine to the point of walking away from medicine entirely.

What if we could find a job that works for us instead of trying to contort ourselves into an ill-fitting job?

I talk a lot about this from a negotiation angle, but how do we actually find the jobs that are a better fit for us and evaluate potential employers?

In today's episode, I'm joined by Family Medicine physician and physician wellbeing advocate, Dr. Lara Hochman. She shares how she's breaking the burnout cycle and evaluating opportunities by matching physicians with physician-owned practices.

Three Things You'll Learn In This Episode

- How to create a long, fulfilling career

The brokenness of many jobs have cost us a lot of talented physicians. How can we keep doctors in medicine working jobs they really love?

- What we need to be asking about potential employers

Most employers are on their best behavior during an interview, so where do we find out what working there is actually like?

- Why we have to be clear on what we want before the interview

How do we optimize the potential of a role while still protecting ourselves in case we never get there?

Guest Bio

Lara Hochman, MD is a Family Medicine physician, and advocate for fellow physicians' wellbeing amidst rising burnout and dissatisfaction. Her own experiences led her to discover the ways physicians lost autonomy, and how to reclaim their focus on helping patients.

Lara founded Happy Day Health, a boutique physician matchmaking agency to match doctors with well run, physician-owned private practices where they can avoid burnout and enjoy practicing medicine again.

To find out how you can work with Dr. Lara, visit www.happydayhealth.co.

You can also find her on;

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/larahochman

Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCorwNuzOmzeH25dDy6i6N5w

TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@happydaymd

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/happydaymd

I recently dipped my toes into the world of real estate investing, and what I found really interesting is how transferable the skills we use to negotiate our contracts are in other arenas.

I didn't get the result I was looking for, but I can safely say that my negotiation skills gave me the tools to get my offer accepted and walk away when the deal wasn't serving me.

So what are the 2 contract negotiation tools that showed up in my foray into real estate?

In this episode, I share why negotiation is a skill you'll use a lot more than you think.

Three Things You'll Learn In This Episode

- Why negotiation is an important life skill we use everywhere

Negotiation isn't just a skill set you use when you're negotiating a contract, where else does it show up?

- Simple ways to sweeten the deal and make it a no-brainer for the other side

What did we do to get our real estate offer accepted, beating our cash offers for more money?

- Why we ultimately walked away from the deal and what it teaches us

How do we empower ourselves to walk away from a deal that just won't serve our goals?

For many of us, the concept of negotiating for a great contract is focused on money and time, but there's actually one category that is way more valuable.

Energy is a resource that we should aim to maximize and advocate for in a negotiation because it drives our ability to thrive in our jobs.

How do we determine what impacts our energy, and what steps can we take to manage it more effectively and compassionately?

In this episode, I'm going to share how energy factors into a negotiation, and how to make sure it serves us.

Three Things You'll Learn In This Episode

- Why we should consider energy as a resource in our negotiations

How do we present our energy as something that's critical to how well we do our jobs?

- How to work more efficiently

Can we control how energized, focused and 100% all-in we are at work?

- How to critically appraise your week and see what's serving us energy-wise

What options do we have to deal with energy depleting tasks?

When we decide to leave a job that's not serving us, it's not always as easy as resigning and having a smooth exit. Very often our contracts are riddled with hurdles and landmines that turn a simple exit into more of a full-on extrication, but that doesn't mean we have no options.

What factors make it hard to exit in a painless way? How do we deal with long notice periods and non-compete clauses?

In this episode, I pick up from last week and talk about what could possibly make a smooth exit impossible and what you can do about it.

Three Things You'll Learn In This Episode

- How to prepare yourself to exit your contract

Even if we're getting a lawyer involved in the contract termination, what "pre-game homework" will make the process easier?

- The challenges we might face during a notice period

A notice period can be a really painful time to show up to work. How do we make sure we're not there longer than we need to be?

- The non-compete decision we all have to make

If we're going to wait out a non-compete, do we have other options to make it more bearable?

By building up our negotiation skills, we get to put effort into making sure our contracts serve us on the front end and that they have an easy exit.

But what if the contracts we signed a couple of years ago don't have a painless escape route? How do we get ourselves in the best headspace to move forward?

It's easy to get caught up in a shoulda-woulda-coulda tailspin, but shame won't get us to the next step. A bad contract doesn't mean a bad career - there is always a way out.

In this episode, I'm going to talk about the mindset for getting out of a bad contract relatively unscathed.

Three Things You'll Learn In This Episode

- How to create a strong mental cushion for yourself

Instead of feeling bad, how do we get into the headspace to find a solution and confidently take action?

- Why there are more solutions to a bad contract than you think

What are some solutions we can start considering to get out of a bad contract?

- The importance of going easy on yourself

Why do we have to stop beating our past selves up for not thinking about our exit when we signed the contract?

In negotiations, I always stress the power of leverage and improving your next best alternative. No alternative beats a large stockpile of money earned through your investments.

Earning a high income isn't the same as being wealthy, so now that we've negotiated an amazing salary, the next move is putting that money to work for us. For the average doctor working full-time and feeling overwhelmed at the thought of starting to invest, what's the first step we can take?

In this episode, ophthalmologist and oculoplastics surgeon, life coach, and money mindset expert, Dr. Elisa Chiang shares how to take a step toward financial independence.

Three Things You'll Learn In This Episode

- The perks of having wealth

Does financial independence make us stronger at the negotiating table?

- The difference between syndication and traditional investing

There are different ways to get involved in real estate, both hands-on and more passive. How do we choose the right path for us?

- How wealth-building can keep us in medicine for longer

Can financial independence make you a better and less burnt-out physician?

Guest Bio

Elisa Chiang, MD, Ph.D. is an ophthalmologist and oculoplastics surgeon, life coach, money mindset expert and the founder of Grow Your Wealthy Mindset.

For more information, visit https://www.growyourwealthymindset.com and follow @growyourwealthymindset on Instagram.

Kenny Rogers sang "You've got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em, know when to walk away and know when to run." These lyrics are actually very applicable to negotiations - especially when it comes to deciding what your bottom line is.

We talk a lot about setting a high expectation goal, but the minimum we're willing to accept is equally important.

How do we determine what would trigger us to walk away? Why do we need to set this before the negotiation? In this episode, I talk about what Kenny Rogers classic song can teach us about negotiation.

Three Things You'll Learn In This Episode

- How to determine if you'll thrive in a specific work environment?

Successful poker players are experts at identifying tells. How do we use our bottom line to notice red flags about employers?

- Strategic vs. emotional responses

How do we make sure you're giving an answer based on a strategic decision and not an impulsive reaction?

- The importance of having a similarly attractive alternative

Why is it so important to have a 'next best option' when we're negotiating?

Negotiation is a highly portable and transferable skill. As physicians, we don't immediately associate negotiation with what we do on a daily basis, but influencing our patients makes us far more skilled negotiators than we think.

I'm joined by a physician who took the negotiating skills she picked up in her patient interactions and applied them to a highly successful real estate business.

How do we shift our conversational skills into more of a business strategy? How do we shift our mindset on negotiation so that we see it as a process of collaborative problem-solving?

In this episode, psychiatrist and owner of Black Swan Real Estate, Elaine Stageberg, shares how doctors can apply the negotiation skills we gain from our work to other areas of our lives.

Three Things You'll Learn In This Episode

- The power of a physician's negotiation skills

How do we apply the negotiation skills we pick up from communicating with patients to our other business ventures?

- Why negotiation doesn't have to be a win-lose game

How do we create a collaborative problem-solving environment in our negotiation instead of a combative, transactional one?

- How to structure a deal where everyone wins

Why do we have to approach negotiation from an "Infinite Game" mindset?

Guest Bio

Elaine Stageberg, MD, MHA is a psychiatrist, mother of 4, & Owner of Black Swan Real Estate. She owns & manages a portfolio of >$130 million in assets under management. Through real estate investing, she reached financial freedom in her 30s and now helps others to do the same. Black Swan has delivered exceptional returns to hundreds of passive investors.For more information and to connect with Elaine in a 30-minute call, visit http://meetblackswan.com.

Book Mentioned

The Infinite Game by Simon Sinek