How to Stay Calm through Complaints (Even When It’s Personal)

Can you keep cool when you receive a complaint about your work?Complaints are part and parcel of every profession. No matter how common they may be and how hard you work to avoid them, the anxiety that you’ll get one is always there. It’s even more nerve-wracking if you work in healthcare. Often, complaints come with threats of referral to a professional regulator. All of a sudden, your career might be on the line.This week, Dr Annalene Weston of Dental Protection Australia joins us to discuss how to stop taking complaints personally. We talk about the thought process that comes with patient complaints and discuss strategies on how to depersonalise and best deal with them.If you want to know the mindset shift that will change how you deal with complaints., listen to our full conversation in this episode of You Are Not a Frog.Here are three reasons why you should listen to the full episode:Learn the root of practitioners’ fear of receiving a complaint.Find out how you can shift your mindset around getting complaints.Discover the value of support when dealing with complaints inside and outside your control.Episode Highlights[04:41] Getting More Complaints in Healthcare[10:19] Getting Affected by Complaints Even When You’re Not at Fault[13:39] Fear of Complaint[18:42] Mindset Shift around Getting a Complaint[25:15] Understanding It from the Patient’s Point of View[34:21] Being Right vs Being Good in a Relationship[38:49] Dealing with Things Outside Your Control[43:20] Getting Struck Off[45:36] What Helps When Dealing with Complaints[53:42] How to Depersonalise Complaints[57:57] Annalene’s Top Three Tips in Dealing with Complaints[1:01:04] Forgive YourselfResourcesDental Protection AustraliaConnect with Dr Annalene Weston: LinkedIn | TwitterEpisode 78: Complaints and How to Survive Them Ep1: Preparing to Fail Well with Drs Sarah Coope, Annalene Weston and Sheila BloomerEpisode 80: Complaints and How to Survive Them Ep2: What to Do When You Make a Mistake with Drs Clare Devlin and Dr John PowellEpisode 82: Complaints and How to Survive Them Ep3: Surviving the Process with Drs Jessica Harland, Caroline Walker, and Heidi MounseyFrederik Imbo: How not to take things personally | TED TalkGetting to Yes by Roger Fisher and William UryDownload our free ‘Just...

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The podcast for GPs, hospital doctors and other professionals in high-stakes, high-stress jobs who want to thrive rather than just survive. You studied for years, you’re really good at what you do but you’ve noticed that you’re starting to feel overwhelmed, overworked and under-resourced. You may be comparing yourself to a frog in boiling water - the heat has built up so slowly that you haven’t noticed the extra-long days becoming the norm. You may feel on the edge and trapped in the very job that you’ve spent years working towards. Here’s the problem, frogs only have two choices; stay and be boiled alive, or jump out of the pan. The good news is that you are not a frog. You have many more choices than you think you do. You don’t have to quit, and nor should stress and burnout be inevitable. It is possible to be master of your own destiny, to craft your work life and career so that you can thrive even in the most difficult of situations. There are simple changes you can make which will make a huge difference to your stress levels and help you enjoy life again. Your host is Dr Rachel Morris, GP turned Executive Coach and Specialist in Resilience at Work who knows what it’s like to feel like an exhausted frog. In the podcast, she’ll be talking to friends, colleagues and experts all who have an interesting take on resilience for clever people in high-stakes, high-stress jobs so that together you can take back control to beat stress and burnout, survive and thrive.