Text us here. We'd love to hear from you

It feels like there is something missing. "How did they not see this patient was becoming more unwell?", "I can't trust anyone to do their job".

We tend to think we think with logic at the forefront, but as this episode unpacks all of us have flawed, clouded with emotions and biases. In this episode Tubi and Naomi unpack critical thinking and developing it in out nursing teams.

Thanks for supporting this content. Please share your favourite episode with a colleague today so we can support more leaders.

The Clear Shift Consultation Diagnostic Tool will help you clearly articulate the gaps in language that connects the clinical experience with the executive impact.

"Is nursing turnover eroding your bottom line? Stop managing the crisis and start leading the culture. Book a Strategic Consultation at bettereveryshift.com.au/consultation to turn your clinical culture into a measurable business performance indicator."

Text us here. We'd love to hear from you

"Judgment is an emotion. Every time you articulate a clinical judgment to a colleague, you are delivering an emotional message, whether you like it or not."

In this episode of Better Every Shift, Naomi and Tubi dive into a rich and provocative article by Margaret Bearman et al. titled "Feedback with feelings: the human complexity of expressing judgements about performance." We dismantle the myth that emotions in healthcare are merely "internal psychological states" to be managed in private; instead, we recognize them as the literal "elephant in the room" in every clinical learning environment.

We explore why claiming to give feedback "without judgment" is actually a form of professional dishonesty that can make a situation worse. From the physiological impact of adrenaline and cortisol on our ability to hear properly to the "story" we create in our heads about our peers, this episode provides a roadmap for "naming the edge". Stick around to learn how to move beyond sterile clinical checklists and start having the pragmatic, transparent conversations that actually move the needle on performance.

Key Discussion Points

The Myth of the "Internal State": Why the literature is misleading when it suggests emotions are only the individual's problem to manage.

Judgment as an Emotional Act: Understanding that expressing a judgment is an emotional event for both the supervisor and the trainee.

The Honest Debrief: Why admitting you are upset about a poor outcome can actually lead to a more useful conversation than pretending there is no problem.

Physiological Barriers: How high-stress triggers (like a pager going off) flood the body with chemicals that make it impossible to process complex conversations.

The Pre-Mortem Strategy: How to forecast "icky" feelings on day one to normalize struggle and keep the lines of communication open.

Gendered Judgments: Addressing harmful social hierarchies, such as the "angry mum" feedback trap, and how to keep feedback factual rather than personal.

Pastoral Conversations: Why understanding the context of a student's life is often more powerful than any clinical performance checklist.

Timestamps

[00:00:00] Intro: The Bold Statement—"Judgment is an Emotion".

[00:01:46] The Elephant in the Room: Why we ignore emotions in debrief.

[00:03:00] The Dishonesty of "Feedback Without Judgment".

[00:05:00] Adrenaline and Cortisol: Why you can’t think straight when the pager goes off.

[00:07:00] The Pre-Mortem: Forecasting the "year of disaster" for students.

[00:09:00] Why we value some feedback more than others: Impressing the "right" people.

[00:12:00] Scenario 1: The "Long, Audible Sigh" and naming non-verbal cues.

[00:15:00] Scenario 2: Dismantling gendered judgments and the "Angry Mum" comment.

[00:18:00] Scenario 3: Legitimizing pastoral conversations over checklis

Thanks for supporting this content. Please share your favourite episode with a colleague today so we can support more leaders.

The Clear Shift Consultation Diagnostic Tool will help you clearly articulate the gaps in language that connects the clinical experience with the executive impact.

"Is nursing turnover eroding your bottom line? Stop managing the crisis and start leading the culture. Book a Strategic Consultation at bettereveryshift.com.au/consultation to turn your clinical culture into a measurable business performance indicator."

Text us here. We'd love to hear from you

"Without relationship, that content is not going anywhere.".

In this episode of Better Every Shift, we are joined by Nathan Oliver, a simulation expert and PhD candidate who has spent over a decade leading medical and nursing education in the UK and Australia. Nathan challenges the traditional "medical paradigm" by arguing that rapport, trust, and safety must be prioritized over clinical content if we want learning to actually land.

We dive into the "spicy" world of simulation and debriefing, exploring how to manage disruptive "clinically strong" team members and how to support struggling new grads who feel like they are "underwater". Nathan shares his unique insights on "debriefing by eyebrows"—why your tone and cadence are more important than your specific questions—and the vital importance of mental rehearsal in high-stress emergencies.

Key Discussion Points

• The Social Learning Shift: Moving beyond Kolb’s 1984 model to understand simulation as a social practice where we learn in community.
• Reading the Room: Identifying "micro-communication" leaks and body language in "muted" or "shut down" teams.
• The "Lizard Brain" in the Clinical Space: Why we don't rise to our aspirations under stress but instead lower to our level of training.
• Mental Rehearsal: Why athletics and aviation prioritize mental walkthroughs and why healthcare needs to make this practice explicit.
• Fake vs. Genuine Curiosity: Why your team "smells a rat" when you ask inauthentic, judgment-laden questions.
• The Burnt Memory: A powerful story of how one piece of negative feedback can stop a clinician from apologizing for a decade.

Chapters

Intro: Nathan Oliver’s journey from "underwater" student to simulation expert.

[04:00] The Social Practice of Learning: Watching and reflecting in community.

[06:00] Scenario 1: Managing the highly disruptive but clinically strong team member.

[09:00] Making the Implicit Explicit: Modeling transparency

[17:00] Scenario 2: The struggling new grad—is it capability or stress overload?.

[20:00] The Adrenaline Secretion: Why we can’t think clearly in the first five minutes of an emergency.

[23:00] Debriefing by Eyebrows: The impact of tone, cadence, and genuine curiosity.

[25:00] The Burnt Memory:

[28:00] The Gold Tip for Educators: Why relationship always trumps content.

[31:00] Debriefing the Debrief: stay in the growth space.

Resources

Fixing, Helping and Serving Rachel, Naomi Remen

Author of Kitchen Table Wisdom Daily Good Story

Emotional Culture Deck - Riders and Elephants

Work Nathan is contributing to:

Thanks for supporting this content. Please share your favourite episode with a colleague today so we can support more leaders.

The Clear Shift Consultation Diagnostic Tool will help you clearly articulate the gaps in language that connects the clinical experience with the executive impact.

"Is nursing turnover eroding your bottom line? Stop managing the crisis and start leading the culture. Book a Strategic Consultation at bettereveryshift.com.au/consultation to turn your clinical culture into a measurable business performance indicator."

Text us here. We'd love to hear from you

“If the people aren't part of the agenda... how is that not an email?”

In this episode of Better Every Shift, Naomi and Tubi tackle the "sterility trap"—the dangerous trend where nursing meetings become so focused on "efficiency" and data reporting that they lose the personal connection necessary for effective decision-making. We explore the "tyranny of silence," where a lack of relationship at the leadership level means no one feels safe enough to speak up as one voice when difficult directives are handed down.

Stop wasting your team's time with verbal content downloads. We discuss how to "flip the script" so reporting happens beforehand, leaving your meeting time open for exploration, meaningful questions, and activating your team’s "brains trust". Whether you are a nurse manager or an executive leader, this episode provides a practical framework for moving past "sterile" spaces to create genuine collective responsibility.

Key Discussion Points

• The Sterility Trap: How trying to be efficient by removing "peopleness" and levity actually makes teams less efficient and less capable of tough conversations.
• Flipping the Script: Moving reporting to pre-meeting updates so the live session can focus on exploration: "What risks lie here?" and "What are people worried about?".
• The Tyranny of Silence: Why silence in a meeting is rarely agreement—it’s often isolation and a lack of collective agreement to share the responsibility of speaking up.
• Hiding Behind Slides: Why many leaders rely on data and slides because they lack the facilitation skills to manage strong personalities and open conversations.
• The Social Contract: Setting a meeting agreement to focus on the challenge, not the person, and managing expectations for action over immediate solutions.

What’s In It For You?

You will gain a three-step strategy to "un-sterilize" your meetings and reclaim your team’s focus. You'll learn how to identify which agenda items should have been an email and how to facilitate a conversation that makes clinical data actionable and personal. By the end of this shift, you’ll have the tools to ensure your staff feels heard, reducing the risk of "whinge sessions" and increasing shared responsibility.

Timestamps

• [00:00:00] Intro: The "How is that not an email?"
• [00:02:00] Defining the Sterility Trap: Why efficiency shouldn't kill connection.
• [00:05:00] The Tyranny of Silence and the isolation of leadership.
• [00:08:00] Flipping the Script: Exploration vs. Reporting.
• [00:11:00] Facilitation Mastery: Why you should stop downloading content.
• [00:14:00] The "Brains Trust" and shared responsibility.
• [00:17:00] Setting up the 3-Month Pilot to change your meeting culture.
• [00:22:00] Time limits and avoiding the "whinge session".
• [00:25:00] Making specialty experiences (like Periop) transferable to the whole group.

The "Meeting Script" Analogy: Imagine your meeting is a clinical handover. If you spend the whole time reading the chart out loud, you aren't actually assessing the patient—you're just reciting data the team could hav

Thanks for supporting this content. Please share your favourite episode with a colleague today so we can support more leaders.

"Is nursing turnover eroding your bottom line? Stop managing the crisis and start leading the culture. Book a Strategic Consultation at bettereveryshift.com.au/consultation to turn your clinical culture into a measurable business performance indicator."

Text us here. We'd love to hear from you

“When was the last time you told a peer the brutal truth about your workload?”

In this episode of Better Every Shift, Naomi and Tubi pull back the curtain on the "tyranny of silence" that plagues healthcare management. We’ve normalised unrealistic workloads and a "mama bear" philosophy that tells us we just have to roll our sleeves up and cope. But what happens when that stress causes us to lose our capacity to think clearly and make critical decisions?

We explore the challenge of distorted peer perceptions—the dangerous habit of looking at a colleague’s "wins" while wearing blindfolds to their private struggles. If you’ve ever felt the shame of "not coping" while everyone else seems fine, this episode is your permission to stop running the race alone. Stick around to learn how a 15-minute "intentional tap" can help you re-map your priorities and finally give you the professional leverage to say "no".

Key Discussion Points

The 30-Hour Overtime Trap: Real-world examples of managers doubling their workload without assistance and the silence that follows.

The "Mama Bear" Downside: How our natural desire to care and "just get it done" becomes a barrier to seeking necessary support.

Cognitive Burnout: Recognizing the moment you lose the capacity to assimilate information or make articulable decisions.

Apples vs. Grapes: Why comparing your private struggle to a colleague’s public presentation is a distorted metric of success.

The Flow-On Risk: Why failing to formalize your struggle isn't just a personal issue—it's a direct risk to patient care that amplifies as it flows down the chain.

Choosing Brave: How one response to a corporate plan gave a whole team the permission to prioritize recruitment over deliverables.

What’s In It For You?

You will walk away with a strategy to formalise your experience before it reaches the point of despair. You’ll learn why regular, "unproductive-looking" meetings are actually the most valuable safety valves in your cohort. Most importantly, you’ll gain the scripts to move beyond saying "I'm busy" to being intentional about what you are struggling with, allowing your peers to help you re-allocate or stop ineffective work.

Timestamps

[00:00:00] Intro: The "Brutal Truth" and the Blindfolds of Peer Comparison.

[00:02:00] The Mama Bear Philosophy: Why we feel we "just have to cope".

[00:04:00] Shame and Despair: The emotional weight of the "apples and oranges" comparison.

[00:06:00] Distorted Perceptions: Why a great presentation doesn't mean a manager is coping.

[00:07:00] Burnout Metrics: When you lose the ability to think clearly.

[00:09:00] The Normalization of Unrealism: How we set up the next person for failure.

[00:11:00] Role and Goal Clarity: Ending the "Tyranny of Silence".

[00:12:00] The 15-Minute Intentional Tap: How to ask for help.

[00:14:00] Permission to Say No: Influencing your team by choosing brave.

[00:15:00] The Ultimate Risk: How leadership silence flows to the patient bedside.

About Better Every Shift

Better Every Shift is the podcast for brilliant healthcare professionals who believe that self-regulation and honest reflection are the keys to a better shift. Hosted by Naomi and Tubi

"Is nursing turnover eroding your bottom line? Stop managing the crisis and start leading the culture. Book a Strategic Consultation at bettereveryshift.com.au/consultation to turn your clinical culture into a measurable business performance indicator."

Text us here. We'd love to hear from you

"One week from today, you will have forgotten 90% of everything you learned in your last training session."

In this episode of Better Every Shift, Naomi and Tubi tackle the "Ebbinghaus forgetting curve" and the massive amount of energy wasted on professional development that never makes it back to the clinical floor. We explore the critical gap between becoming a clinical expert and achieving "adult development"—the level of maturity, professionalism, and team-player skills that mandatory training simply doesn't touch.

From the thousands of dollars in untouched nursing scholarships to the power of non-formal learning—like standup comedy, oncology massage, and managing a cricket team—we discuss how to take charge of your own growth. Whether you are a manager trying to keep your head above water or a clinician waiting for "permission" to grow, this episode provides a roadmap for making learning stick through intentional coaching and small, daily actions.

Key Discussion Points

The Scholarship Imbalance: Why significant study funding and grants are sitting unutilized and how to bridge the gap between expectation and initiative.

Adult Development vs. Clinical Expertise: Moving beyond "ticking boxes" to understand how to support your manager and your team with professional maturity.

The Power of "Weird" Learning: How Tubi’s interest in food and Naomi’s presenter mastery course provide more clinical value than traditional postgraduate degrees.

Finding Your Why: Exploring why healthcare clinicians are hitting burnout when their "North Star" for care conflicts with a rigid system.

The 30-Day "Critical Move": Why the first 30 days after a workshop are the most important for embedding new behaviors.

Facilitation vs. Presentation: Why ditching the PowerPoint for a "facilitated conversation" is the most powerful way to lead a team meeting.

What’s In It For You?

You will learn how to identify your own "pain points" as a starting point for development and how to leverage community roles to build professional skills. For managers, we share a novel coaching approach—the "angel on the shoulder"—that provides 30 days of daily prompts to ensure your team's training actually results in a "critical move".

Timestamps

[00:00:00] Intro: The 90% Forgetting Curve.

[00:02:00] The mystery of the unapplied scholarships.

[00:04:00] What "Adult Development" actually looks like in a clinical team.

[00:07:00] Non-formal learning: From oncology massage to standup comedy.

[00:12:00] Why clinicians lose sight of their "Why" and fall into burnout.

[00:17:00] Managers: How to leverage your team's interests for collective growth.

[00:20:00] Why PowerPoint kills responsibility in the room.

[00:25:00] The Brisbane Workshop: 30 days of "Angel on your shoulder" coaching.

Resources Mentioned

David JP Phillips: Presenter Mastery Course.

Simon Sinek’s T

Thanks for supporting this content. Please share your favourite episode with a colleague today so we can support more leaders.

The Clear Shift Consultation Diagnostic Tool will help you clearly articulate the gaps in language that connects the clinical experience with the executive impact.

"Is nursing turnover eroding your bottom line? Stop managing the crisis and start leading the culture. Book a Strategic Consultation at bettereveryshift.com.au/consultation to turn your clinical culture into a measurable business performance indicator."

Text us here. We'd love to hear from you

“This is a container ship. You are getting it to turn 180 degrees... that doesn't happen overnight; it’s little bits over time”.

In Part B of our deep dive into civility with Renee Thompson, we move beyond identifying "near enemies" to the practical framework of sustaining culture change. We explore why "tattling" to a manager is a symptom of a weak culture and how to empower employees to have "healthy workforce conversations" directly with one another. Renee breaks down her "top-down, bottom-up" approach, emphasizing that while leaders are responsible for the department's culture, the entire team must be equipped with the language to protect it.
From bypassing the "lizard brain" with pre-prepared scripts to understanding why psychological safety has nothing to do with comfort, this episode provides the evidence-based system needed to eliminate bullying and sustain a professional clinical environment.

Turning the Container Ship: Understanding that culture change usually takes about six months to "turn the corner" and a full year to implement fully.
The Top-Down, Bottom-Up Framework: Why you must strengthen the executive level while simultaneously empowering frontline teams with data and tools.
Data Over Assumptions: Using organizational, leadership, and team quizzes to find exactly where your behavioral gaps are.
The Curiosity Hat: How to respond to an eye-roll or a huffed sigh by simply "naming the behavior" and asking, "Are you okay?".
Bypassing the Amygdala: Using scripts to give your prefrontal cortex a "ready-to-go" response so you don't freeze, clobber, or run away when faced with negativity.
Honesty and Respect: The "willingness" script—how to set boundaries by saying, "I am willing to continue this conversation as long as you are willing to communicate with respect".
Psychological Safety vs. Accountability: Why safety means being willing to speak up even when you are incredibly uncomfortable.
The Interprofessional Challenge: Recognizing that incivility is a "human issue," not just a nursing one, and must include physicians and allied health to be successful.

You will walk away with a toolkit of scripts and principles (like "Notice, Question") that allow you to confront disruptive behavior without losing your cool. You’ll learn how to stop "batting the ball across the fence" and start building a relationship-based culture of coaching and feedback.
Timestamps
[00:00:00] Intro: The Container Ship Analogy.
[00:02:00] Data and Evidence: Why you can't make assumptions about your department.
[00:05:00] The Framework: Top-down, bottom-up, and everything in between.
[00:07:00] Using Quizzes to find your organizational weak spots.
[00:08:00] Naming the Eye-Roll: How to wear the "Curiosity Hat".
[00:10:00] The Science of Scripts: Bypassing your Amygdala.
[00:13:00] Honesty and Respect: Stopping the "talk behind the back" cycle.
[00:16:00] Why even the CEO needs a coach.
[00:21:00] Psychological Safety: Speaking up when you're uncomfortable.
[00:24:00] Brea

Thanks for supporting this content. Please share your favourite episode with a colleague today so we can support more leaders.

The Clear Shift Consultation Diagnostic Tool will help you clearly articulate the gaps in language that connects the clinical experience with the executive impact.

"Is nursing turnover eroding your bottom line? Stop managing the crisis and start leading the culture. Book a Strategic Consultation at bettereveryshift.com.au/consultation to turn your clinical culture into a measurable business performance indicator."

This episode of Better Every Shift for Nurses focuses on the "long game" of nursing culture, featuring an in-depth conversation with Renee Thompson, the founder of the Healthy Workforce Institute. We dive into the hidden layers of workplace incivility, exploring the concept of the "near enemy"—those "squishy," covert behaviors like backstabbing and exclusion that are harder to define than overt bullying but just as damaging to a team.

Outright bad behavior is easy to see and manage. It’s the ‘not quite right’ behaviors that are actually harder to pick up and realise how damaging they are.

In Part A of our series on civility, Renee Thompson joins us to share her journey from the bedside to becoming a global advocate for healthy workforces. After a "worst-of-her-life" 14-month stint as a unit director, Renee realised that healthcare is hard enough without coworkers making it harder. We tackle the uncomfortable reality of staffing crises and the dangerous "math" managers do when they tolerate a behaviorally toxic nurse because they are afraid to lose a "clinically competent" body.

The Near Enemy vs. The Far Enemy: Why love and hate are clear, but the "squishier" behaviors of exclusion and backstabbing are harder to hold people accountable for.
Rules for Engagement: How to use the Talking Stick technique and established common ground to resolve clashing between different teams or departments,.
The Compact of Professional Behaviors: A simple, one-page tool where every team member contributes to defining how they will—and will never—treat each other.
Leading Your Own Groundswell: What to do when your own boss isn’t supportive of a better culture. Hint: You are the adult, and no one is coming to save you,,.
Therapeutic Extraction: Why playing the "long game" by removing a toxic employee actually results in a waiting list of people who want to work in your department.
Bridging the Gap with HR: Moving past the "brick wall" by using collaborative documentation and building a behavioral case based on evidence, not just feelings.
Standing Agenda Items: A practical tip for un-normalizing bad behavior by making "Healthy Workforce" the first item on every meeting agenda.

[00:00:00] Intro The "Near Enemy" concept

[00:03:00] Renee Thompson’s journey: Bedside nursing to the Healthy Workforce Institute

[00:06:00] Scenario: Managing clashing managers and "animosity between teams"

[00:08:00] The Talking Stick and rules for engagement

[00:10:00] Creating a Compact of Professional Behaviors

[00:13:00] When your leader isn't on board: Creating your own groundswell

[00:15:00] The Toxic Nurse Math: Why one toxic nurse is never better than no nurse

[00:19:00] Partnering with HR: Collaborative documentation and building a case

[00:23:00] The link between civility and patient safety

[00:25:00] Making healthy workforce a standing agenda item

To access Resources from Renee Thompson and Healthy Workforce Institute visit here: https://healthyworkforceinstitute.com/

Tea Room Notes:

"Is nursing turnover eroding your bottom line? Stop managing the crisis and start leading the culture. Book a Strategic Consultation at bettereveryshift.com.au/consultation to turn your clinical culture into a measurable business performance indicator."