Better Aged Care Professionals Ask Better Questions. Lindsay Jr. Tighe

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ months. What I found really amazing was that I automatically started to do kinder things during the day without having to think about it – it became a new habit, and what a nice new habit to have! What is even more lovely is that when people talk about me nowadays, they will often refer to me as being a ‘kind person’, so that reaffirms for me that I am being more of the person that I want to be in the world.

      I hope that this simple example provides you with awareness about the importance of self-reflection, and also about starting to identify what is important to you within your role. The key action that will make you stand out from other professionals is that you will take the important step of choosing how you wish to fulfil your role, and what values and behaviours you will uphold in doing this. The important thing is that you make this choice, rather than simply ‘going with the flow’ in an unconscious state, and end up operating in a way that wasn’t what you wanted to do.

      Case example

      A gentleman attended our workshop where we shared the skills that you are about to learn in this book. He had been a community nurse working with elderly clients for the past 25 years, and it was clear from the interactions in the group that he was extremely well liked and respected by his colleagues. He engaged fully in the workshop and was very open to hearing the key messages, particularly the ones around rethinking what your role is and that there are many ways to be ‘helpful’ (which you will read about shortly).

      During the workshop, he realised that he was adopting the role of a nurse who ‘always knew best’ and that he consistently fixed things for his clients in the belief that this was what his role was and that he was being helpful and caring. He had genuinely believed that he was fulfilling the role in the right way and that this was the way to be a good community nurse. Whilst in some instances it was true that he did know best and it was his role to fix things, he realised that if he really believed in enabling and empowering his clients and drawing out their amazingnesss, then his approach had to change. Indeed, he recognised that it was his fundamental belief about his role that needed to change, which would then give him permission to change the way he carried out his role in practice. He was going to have to start to reassess himself and the way he was interacting with his clients – his traditional nursing style would have to change.

      During the follow-up workshop that he attended with me, he explained to the group how, after the first workshop, he had returned to work with the knowledge that he needed to change and to put what he had learnt into practice. He began using the techniques shared in this book and became a questioner and listener rather than a ‘fixer’ or ‘teller’. He was amazed how positively most of his clients responded, and was really shocked to find that he was suddenly enjoying his role so much more than he used to because he saw himself as a facilitator of outcomes rather than a fixer. He actually shared with me that he was feeling less pressured to always have answers, and because of this he found the role to be far more fulfilling and enjoyable.

      For me, this report was very moving because it demonstrated that not only had this wonderful nurse been prepared to be open-minded about himself and recognise some limitations in his approach; he had also put into action what he had learnt to amazing effect. He had demonstrated beautifully that by being open-minded and having a willingness to change and do things differently, using questions can transform the way you fulfil your role and enable you to be even more effective than you are currently.

      This is a great example of consciously choosing how you wish to fulfil your role, and the good news is that you can choose at any time to change.

      To conclude this chapter, I’d like to suggest that professionals who have a desire to ask Better Questions will highly value:

      •empowerment

      •caring

      •flexibility

      •open-mindedness

      •fulfilling potential.

      There will be more on the skills and qualities required to be a great questioner in a later chapter, but I hope this is a starting point for you to candidly consider your own approach and style, and the way you fulfil your professional role.

CHAPTER SUMMARY Most of us unconsciously ‘tell’ because we believe that is our role. If we don’t choose to do something different, we will keep doing what we’ve always done. Consciously choosing can be very powerful because it helps us to act in integrity and really think about the sort of professional we want to be.

      Chapter 3

      What else drives ‘telling’?

      The previous chapter provided some valuable insight into helping you to think about your role in aged care and your approach to it. I am sure that most of you will relate to that sense of conformity and ‘fitting in’ to the norms, and also of unconsciously conforming to the way things are or have been done in your workplace and culture, rather than by a way of your choosing.

      I’d now like to take some time to highlight what other factors are at play in our role definition that need to be given further consideration to help us deal with the challenge of being less of a ‘teller’ and more of an ‘asker’. I always find that when we consider the prospect of asking more questions of someone instead of telling them what to do, there is some internal resistance that comes from the person who is doing the asking. In this chapter, I will attempt to deal with some of the potential issues that arise for the person who assumes the role of an ‘asker’.

      I am going to work through a practical example that you will be able to relate to and that will help to demonstrate the points I’d like to make. Let’s imagine that a case manager working in aged care – let’s call him Martin – has a 65-year-old client Jill, and that historically, mainly due to a lack of awareness, he has been more of a ‘teller’ than an ‘asker’ and so has created an habitual way of responding to her.

      The example we will use is where Jill is talking to Martin about a problem she is having with a family member and Martin simply responds by advising her what she needs to do. Indeed, Martin identifies with the ‘telling’ space because he considers himself to be helpful and has always believed that dealing with situations in this way was best, as he knows that his clients appreciate his advice. However, fortunately Martin recently attended a workshop where he learnt the skill of asking Better Questions. Whilst at the workshop, he realises that he has been too much of a ‘teller’ in the past and decides that when he returns to work he will start to ask some of those Better Questions.

      Martin returns to work, and a week later he has an appointment to visit Jill again. When he goes out for the visit, Jill shares an update with him and advises that she is still having a problem with the family member she discussed with him last time. Jill will undoubtedly have an expectation that Martin will provide another solution for her – after all, this is what has always happened in the past.

      Now, Martin is feeling a little apprehensive about changing his approach and asking some Better Questions of Jill, believing that she may not be comfortable if he adopts this approach. He is concerned that she will think he is in a bad mood or that he is being unhelpful; after all, case managers are meant to be there for their clients!

      You can see from this example that once you have overcome СКАЧАТЬ