More Spring Gardening
Last month I used a gardening metaphor to talk about building culture. I don’t know if it’s spring in the air or what, but I seem to still have gardening on the mind.
A lot of organizations talk about provider wellness, but they often conceptualize it in problematic ways. They may think of it as a specific metric that can be quantified with a survey. Or a particular state of tranquility and peace. Or maybe a tank that you can refill when the needle points to “empty.”
I like to think of wellness as a natural state of thriving. Think of a plant in a garden. From the time it pokes its head up from the ground, it has the impulse to develop and grow. How fully that impulse is realized depends on the conditions of the garden. Is it the right kind of soil? Is there enough sun and water? Is there room to spread out its roots and branches? Are there insects nibbling on its leaves, or fungi sapping its strength?
The gardener’s job isn’t to make the plant grow, it’s to give it what it needs to fulfill its potential. With that in mind, here are a few common misconceptions about provider wellness that the gardening metaphor helps dispel.
“Wellness is mostly about giving providers more time and compensation.”
Yes, if you deprive a plant of nutrients or water, it can’t thrive. But once it has enough, giving it more won’t help. A gardener is a detective. You can’t just keep dumping on fertilizer and turning on the sprinkler. You usually have to look deeper.
“Wellness is about helping providers be more resilient to stress.”
When a plant is being eaten by slugs, you get rid of the slugs. You don’t laminate the plant in plastic so it’s harder to chew on. For most plants, the degree of hardiness is largely predetermined. You get more bang for your buck removing the cause of the stress.
“Some providers will never be satisfied. They’re just complainers.”
There’s no such thing as a plant that doesn’t want to thrive. That’s not a thing. Maybe it’ll never thrive in your particular garden, but that should never be your first conclusion, or your second, or your third. A plant that’s struggling needs more support. You can let it shrivel up, or you can try to figure out what it needs.
“Wellness is a target you can hit, or a goal you can achieve.”
Once your garden is thriving, you don’t get to hang up your tools and ignore it. There are always new challenges and emerging needs to be met. If you don’t enjoy gardening for its own sake, you probably shouldn’t be a gardener. It’s a never-ending job. When the harvest is done, it’s time to prepare for the next season.
