Grace, Inspiration, Fulfillment, Timeless, Soulful (GIFTS): The Why and How of Podcasts for Recognition and Mentoring of Faculty in Medicine

Abstract

This commentary offers the reader an alternative to mentoring through the use of PODCASTS. By providing the listener with an understanding of the challenges and opportunities for self-reflection and sharing of experiences by the interviewees, we are impacting the listener attitudes and future goals through lessons learned.

There is no denying that mentoring faculty in academic medicine is challenging. Similarly, there is also no denying that mentoring in academic medicine is one of the most fulfilling responsibilities a faculty member can undertake. To quote author and speaker John Maxwell “One of the greatest values of mentors is the ability to see ahead what others cannot see and to help them navigate a course to their destination”. ¹ One of the ways in which this can be done is by sharing personal insights, knowledge, and experiences that enable the mentee’s success. Within this commentary, we explore 1 approach to mentoring large audiences through a podcast series.

The podcasting concept was introduced around 2004 when 2 media experts, Dave Winer and Adam Curry, developed a way to automate media distribution of audio files through Real Simple Syndication (RSS). ² In its essence, podcasting is the preparation and distribution of digital audio files using RSS feeds. Subsequently, these files may be uploaded to streaming services, which users can listen to on any smart device. ³ In many respects, podcasts are the 21^st Century’s answer to television’s talk-shows of old, where the interviewee shares insights, opinions, and experiences often sprinkled with humor. The goal is to bring the listeners into the room, so to speak, where they may identify with the messages, learn, and grow. Podcasts have opened the opportunity to learn from a wide array of people with important messages to share and provide an easily accessible, and often an enjoyable, learning experience.

As of 2022, about 424 million people worldwide listened to podcasts. In the United States, more than 62% (177 million) of all Americans will have listened to a podcast in their lifetime. ⁴ Among US podcast listeners, approximately 65% are 35 years of age or older; about 74% of podcast listeners tune in to learn new things, while others listen regularly for entertainment, news of social events, world news, relaxation, and/or for inspiration. ⁴ According to a Nielsen report, the most popular podcast genres for light listeners are music (53%), arts (52%), and health and fitness (51%) whereas dedicated podcast listeners prefer history (37%), news (36%), true crime (36%), and science (34%). ⁴

What makes podcasts unique is the content. Podcasts are a communication type that can be done through a seminar or interview where guest speakers answer questions by summarizing an entire body of knowledge and evidence, based on their training, practice, and life experiences. Through podcasts, the audience may begin to understand the pattern of thinking of an expert, what they view as important, and how they assign value among a host of choices. It is how they define their “bull’s eye” for best choice/decision and remove distractions that often provides the “aha” moment for the listening audience. When podcasts are done well, they describe the essential why, how, and what for the listener.

Whereas the average length of a podcast episode is 25 to 30 min, the length can vary across genres. They can be anywhere from 5 min (soundbite collections) to a full hour (lengthier interview with stories and insights), depending on the original purpose and content of the podcast. Some of the more popular podcast formats include interview, conversational, educational, solo, non-fiction storytelling, news, podcast theater, and bite-sized content/limited run series. ⁵ Within these formats, one finds a collection of podcasts dedicated to mentoring and coaching. These podcasts have a common goal: helping others grow, develop, and reach their full potential; thereby giving an individual the opportunity to take responsibility for their personal and career development.

There are no boundaries to mentorship resources and delivery methods. Mentoring can be face-to-face or remote (virtual) format, and one-to-one or as a group in size/scope. The mentees and mentors decide which approach is best depending on their learning styles. The mentees and mentors decide which communication style will be used in their collaboration depending on their individual learning styles. This includes the frequency of touchpoints as well as the style (in-person vs virtual, independent work vs shadowing). The importance of mentoring is that it provides motivation and guidance, not limited to sharing only knowledge and skills, but also providing insight into their personal growth by reviewing their own personal journey including successes and failures as well as lessons learned. In a previous study of clinician interviews, clinicians shared their insight that it is difficult to mentor and guide others if they themselves are not consistently introspective and self-revelatory first. ⁶ Ultimately sharing and learning from stories, colleagues and trainees can also contribute to the growth of the mentee’s character and the development of clinic, hospital, and healthcare systems. ⁷

The main challenge post pandemic has been to overcome the pandemic fatigue due to information overload both written and through social media. The risk for essential knowledge and pearls of wisdom getting drowned in the surging floods of noisy information is real. Hence endorsement by key leaders, mentors of the guests featured in the podcast is essential. Having the podcasts in different platforms and available just-in-time to faculty members is the key for the message not to get lost. Also important is increasing the shelf life by having the podcast saved in a secure location so that faculty members may be redirected to these pearls.

Within the division of General Internal Medicine (GIM) at a large health care facility in the Midwest of the United States, a novel approach was used to introduce new faculty to more experienced faculty, utilizing podcasts. The title of this series of podcasts is GIFTS (Grace, Inspiration, Fulfillment, Timeless, Soulful). The purpose of the GIFTS podcasts is to allow insight into the journey of each guest faculty interviewed on what they did to arrive at where they currently are. In other words, mentors teach by example. The GIFTS podcast is a series of interviews with experienced senior GIM staff. The goal of these interviews is to inspire and motivate younger faculty as they make career choices, through recalled experiences as recounted on the podcasts. The requirement for receiving an invite to be interviewed in the podcast was that the faculty member was a seasoned staff member who was willing to share their personal experience and knowledge with their colleagues. Of the 8 podcasts completed to date, 3 were completed immediately prior to the colleagues retirement, and others had 15 or more years of experience. The response rate to the invite was determined by their availability as well as enthusiasm to participate in the podcast interview. The episodes are recorded on a rolling basis based on scheduling conflicts.

By sharing their extraordinary professional journeys, staff learn from and inspire each other. While discussing their careers during the GIFTS podcast, highlights included guests describing their careers built on hope, effort, serendipity, and chance meeting with someone who would become a mentor. Personal growth is a life-long journey shaped by individual efforts, sponsorship, and mentorship efforts of leaders as well as being opportunistic by taking advantage of chance opportunities describing to others how to succeed in these moments. Our faculty podcasts highlight experiences like these to inform younger faculty to keep pushing at the door so you can “get in the room,” manage feeling of frustration, and avoid abandoning opportunities too early, only to see others take advantage—a lesson learned the hard way by some and a mental mistake to be avoided. Many of the podcast interviewees expressed their vulnerability with honesty and encouraged behaviors to embrace this without judgment. In many respects, the lines between mentors and mentees were blurred as we learned about the journey many of our colleagues have undertaken, the hurdles they have overcome, and the lessons they have learned along the way. These are life’s lessons that we embrace from these podcasts.

Thus far, 8 podcasts have been included in the GIFTS podcast series with favorable feedback. A recent survey of the general GIM staff employees using SLIDO ⁸ indicates that 50% of survey responders viewed at least one of the GIFTS podcasts. Among those who did not view any of the podcasts, time was the biggest barrier. Among those who did view at least 1 podcast, 55% indicated that it did impact their career and life goals. The comments included “inspiring and interesting,” “there is value in other people’s lessons and stories,” “good and helpful,” and “helpful in hearing of the impact of chance meetings.” When this same survey was conducted among the GIM faculty, over 80% responded that they had viewed at least 1 podcast. The 2 biggest barriers among those who did not view the podcasts were time and limited access through the internet. Over 78% thought the podcasts made an impact on their life choices. The take-away from the podcasts, among those who viewed at least 1 episode, was “taking 1 day at a time,” “focus on the human dimension,” “everyone has struggles,” “persistence and hard work pay off,” and “their stories resonate with mine.” When the interviewees of the podcast were surveyed, they were all satisfied with the experience. When asked what they learned about themselves they indicated that “the experience was life-affirming,” they “enjoyed the reflecting of their past experiences” and “there is more resilience in me than I ever realized.”

Sample of unsolicited feedback on the GIFT podcasts • “I just previewed the GIFTS episode. It was hugely inspiring. [interviewee]. I can’t get over and was teleported into Mann Hall for your lecture (with lots of smiles). Wow, thanks for all that you have contributed. Loved the advice for Women in Medicine, and so many helpful nuggets all along! Just WOW!” • you did such an amazing job with the GIFTS podcast recording! Thank you for having the courage to share your legacy. It was beautifully done. • “Awesome to hear your heart-to-heart chat with [interviewer]. I loved to hear you stress on values and calling to be a great physician. Hope you get to spend a lot more time for family than you had time to do so in the past. You are a valuable colleague and a great role model. Very inspiring.” • “What another fabulous edition of the GIFTS podcast! I learn so much from these. Thank you for all your hard work doing these!” • Truly, each one of the episodes is a big “GIFTS”. On long tiring days, inspiring words of our wise colleagues bring direction, energy and the sense of celebration which can get lost in the day to day mundane- ness.

One of the key determinants of success of these podcasts is the quality of production and ease of access for busy clinician audience. While the availability of online platforms and ease of hosting remote meetings enabled timely recording of the podcast episodes, the production team was very dedicated to ensuring a high-quality editing in post-production phase to ensure the episodes were engaging and appropriate in length. To do so, the team partnered with media experts within our organization with expertise in podcast production. One of the many roles of the production manager was to edit the content/sections to make sure that they added value to the mission of the podcast and removed content that did not add any value. While synchronicity and availability to view at any time is a strength of this platform, it does require a shift in the current mentoring mindset. Other components that were addressed when we considered the podcast vehicle for mentoring at-large included professional identity. We selected and paired moderators with scalable expertise. The moderator was one who was comfortable and has experience moderating, engaging, and had a natural gift to put the guest at ease in order to humanize the experience for a deeper level of personal and professional connection. Relatable in the profession of a physician, and one who could focus on direct questioning without imposing personal and professional experience during the interview. In addition, the moderator needed to target questions that aligned with the mission of the podcast (and avoided questions that did not align with objective/mission). The podcasts needed to address role model identifies and contain take away pearls.

Samples of questions asked in the Podcasts: 1. What are some of your experiences and how did that evolve over mid and late career? 2. What did you find most exciting in your professional journey? 3. What barriers did you face? How would you recommend that people facing similar problems? 4. What did you find most fulfilling? 5. If you could rewind the clock 20 years back, what might you tell yourself to do differently?

When considering the use of podcasts for mentoring we kept coming back to the idea that by sharing personal journeys, perceived road blocks, stumbling career challenges, and unintentional career errors by overthinking or disregarding opportunities that appeared unannounced these mentors stress the role of pausing before making a decision, shared decision with senior colleagues, and discussing with their families for clarity of vision that helped them change a career stalling opportunity to career progressing growth. One of our guest speakers mentioned that she was offered a leadership position early in her career and felt that she was unprepared for the job. However, discussing with her mentors, she was reassured that she could learn on the job with possibility of guidance from mentors, and the opportunity was apt for her. She subsequently served in many senior leadership positions and was grateful that she didn’t close the door by saying no to the opportunity for which she had initially felt unprepared.

The main challenge encountered during the creative process is that although there are some good articles on traditional approaches to mentoring,^{6,9 -12} and there are a few articles on using podcasts for the purpose of medical education,^{13 -15} the medical literature on the use of podcasts for mentoring medical personnel is non-existent. Therefore, we had little to go by for guidance except the determination to explore a unique approach to mentoring during the pandemic. Other limitations and challenges we had to overcome centered around the creation of these podcasts for mentoring purposes such as the availability of media experts with experience in podcast platforms, cost associated with hosting on online platforms, availability of dedicated personnel for marketing, dissemination, and maintenance. The final challenge was the demand on time and uptake of the content. While the focus was to A limitation of the current work is the lack of documented effectiveness. Measurement of effectiveness of GIFT program by identifying mentor mentee and long-term effectiveness by qualitative and quantitative surveys are in progress.

The messages from the GIFTS guest faculty were trifold. (1) Being human and fallible is what we embrace. It is invaluable to learn from each other and to understanding that as we keep learning, we keep growing. A good balance of controlled restlessness without helplessness is what we all strive for. (2) We may not achieve everything that we desired but when we examine our lives more closely, we appreciate that we achieved far more in the aggregate, as a group, than we ever imagined. A balance of understanding what we achieved, and what we did not, can be mutually beneficial, as it kept us humble and human. (3) One message that rang clear and loud from the podcasts was a feeling of gratefulness, camaraderie, and effort to reach out to colleagues with the message that it is okay to experience a journey that appears “zigzag” as it gives an opportunity to experience the beauty of people and places around us. This is something that we would not have experienced if our career progression were a straight line.

Successful podcasts help create a community of listeners unified by meaning and purpose. Podcasts are easily accessible and expand one’s experience, knowledge, as well as the mind. ¹⁶ Listening to well done podcasts can grow and mature our mind, in addition to allowing us to experience other people’s perspectives and seek advice through lessons learned. ¹⁷ If the podcast if focused on someone that is within your community and is a colleague you know and/or admire, learning about their journey from their own words makes their words all the more powerful and consciously or unconsciously will have an impact on your own life journeys. Future research is focused on measuring the degree of impact, while continued efforts are being made to survey the audience to determine changing needs for mentoring within our faculty.