In this episode, Chris and Clara discuss the business of social work, the breadth of social work in society, and the future use of AI in social work.
Born and raised in Tampa, FL, Clara Reynolds is the CEO of the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay and has been a social worker in Tampa since 1993.
Learn more about the USF School of Social Work here.
Chris Groeber: Hi my name is Chris Groeber, and I'm an associate in research in the University of South Florida's College of Behavioral and Community Sciences School of Social Work. Welcome to the Remark-A-Bull podcast.
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Chris Groeber: Well, welcome back, friends, and I am so glad to have some real hardcore field experience to share with you all today. Let me introduce you to Clara Reynolds, who is the president and CEO of the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay. You know, it's so funny we get so caught up, but let me tell you, let me tell you the real story that I find about Clara and the reason I want you guys to be exposed to her, is the fact that she is such an incredible partner in the field and she's one of those people who loves ideas and sees the need for change and is embroiled in the need for change and is willing to get alongside you as a faculty member and sling arms and go to war with you on a lot of these things out there that are affecting us right now. So, I wanted to, I really wanted to spend some time with Clara, talking to you guys to let you guys hear from her a little bit. So, Clara welcome to the Remark-a-Bulle podcast. We are so glad to have you.
Clara Reynolds: I'm so honored to be here, and thank you for the beautiful accolades - your check is in the mail.
Chris: [laughs] I work cheap! No, but Clara, one of the things I want to dig right into is, I really do, when I when I think about presenting, and Clara is on our Professional Advisory Committee, guys, and so she makes recommendations to us regarding curriculum and recruitment and all that stuff and she’s an adjunct faculty person and she also takes a lot of students into paid placements, guys, both bachelor’s and master’s. Clara is one of those people, guys, you look across the room and she's always with you in spirit and with you and collaboration so, Clara, talk about why you think the university-agency relationship is really important that whole town-gown bit.
Clara: You know, I love that question, Chris, because when I was an MSW student, you know a thousand years ago at this point, but back in the 90s, you know there was a real push at that point to have students be in the field, but in the true social service field in the trenches. So, I kind of grew up as a baby social worker believing that you've got to understand how systems of care work before you're really going to be able to help an individual person at the micro level. If you don’t understand how the macro system works, you're never going to be able to get people to that place to better, whatever that might look like for them. So, when I look at USF and I see the direction that we have evolved into, I'm so excited now because for a while now, and this may not be popular and that's okay, you all can disagree with me, there was much more of a push to place students in more private practice clinical settings and I really felt that that was not what ... it wasn't what the community needed, nor did I feel like that was what students needed. So, I love now that we are, as a provider community, and remember, Chris, I'm from Tampa, born and raised, I have been a practicing social worker here since 1993, so we’re talking 30 years. The community has not been a good partner with the School of Social Work and I think that was the result of what we've seen in the past, but now it's so exciting to see students re-engaging back into the field and back into community-based practice and I think our entire community is going to be better for it, as will our students as they progress in their careers.
Chris: Don’t you think, too, and I’ve been, you know, it’s very interesting teaching in a clinical program as more of a macro guy. I think we've changed the definition of clinical, because of the trauma definition and the broadening of definition. So, literally, community placements are clinical placements now. You can't have one without the other.
Clara: You can’t! Absolutely not. Even, you know, in my day, I was a school social work clinical intern and, you know, people thought that school social work was just, you know, dealing with tardies and head lice. Heavens to Betsy, no! I mean, you see first-hand what happens to kids, you see that trauma throughout the, whether it’s early childhood, elementary, middle, high school, so I agree 1000% with you. There is clinical work in every aspect that you're doing, because when you're interfacing with human beings, they're bringing their whole selves to you and they're looking to you to help them in that moment and it is more than just making sure that they get to an appointment or that they get connected to a resource. It’s making sure that they're healthy enough that they're in that place where, when they get there, they’re ready for the next step in their healing journey.
Chris: You know, that to me is exciting, and that broader definition, but it also leads us to something I think you and I share is this intense desire to see entrepreneurialism and/or new ideas and programs come forth in the field that maybe nobody's thought about yet. I feel like we share that; when I'm with you I just feel like there's a real kindred spirit with regards to we've got to be better entrepreneurs and change agents.
Clara: Absolutely. You know, I will again say again, back in the 90s when I was going through school, I never thought that I would ever be a social worker running a business and I really never understood that a non-profit is actually just an IRS designation. It's still a business and it's a business that has to generate income in order to survive and that that’s not a bad word. So, when we think about entrepreneurialism in this nonprofit space I think, you know, I find it to be first of all much more of an art than a science, that you are quilting opportunities together, you’re quilting government grants and funding that, let's face it, if we weren't doing it, government would have to. Government has a responsibility, so I don't think government grants and contracts are a negative thing. I think it's very positive, but I also believe that there's opportunities for social enterprise, that there's opportunities to be able to create a value-added product that communities will find value in and purchase that can then feedback into the mission. So, I truly believe that from our perspective social workers are in a beautiful position to be able to not just be micro change ages but also to change things that the macro level by creating these new funding structures and opportunities.
Chris: Well, and you know, I think that you hit on something really, really important. I remember years ago people would just take the lowest salary and there's this kind of internal oppression among social workers where we think we deserve to be paid less and I mean, I don't think we say that out loud but we just kind of accept these things as, you know, when you tell your parents you're going to be a social worker, “well, you're not going to make any money,” you know, and that sort of stuff just drives me nuts because you mentioned something, a quote that I always think about. You talked about not-for-profit, but not-for-profit doesn't equal for-bankruptcy, you know? You know, it makes me crazy because you know people think because you're not-for-profit you got to do everything on the cheap and well, while that is, the reality is, we do, we've really got to do a better I think a better job of staking off our territory with regards to the business of social work.
Clara: Absolutely, and I mean let’s face it. There is a reason why professional athletes demand higher and higher salaries. As a society, we put value behind what we invest in. If we want to make those real changes across … societal, systemic changes, there has to be value placed on the work and the work can't happen for free. Again, to your point around, you know, none of us sign up for bankruptcy in this. These are businesses that must operate at some sort of profitable level in order to be able to survive and I think we’ve come volumes, and that that’s changing, but it starts with us.
Chris: Absolutely!
Clara: And that’s not taking less.
Chris: Right. Well, you know, and I tell students all the time when they’re going on interviews, “Ask what the midpoint is. Ask what the midpoint is.” You know, because if I'm interviewing somebody, I'm going to be okay, “that person is responsible with their own money or they wouldn't be asking me that question.”
Clara: And the flip side of that, Chris, if somebody is offended by that question, that agency is on the verge of going out of business.
Chris: That, that's right, the culture isn't probably a part of the culture that you you'd want. So, I love the idea of us, you know, kind of blazing new paths. When you look at … I don't know about you, but I've been looking at all this AI stuff and you know there's this all this hubbub about universities and the role of universities in society blah, blah, blah, and I really do think, Clara, we've got to get better, faster, smarter, stronger at how we, as social workers, interact with society and where our place actually is. I don't know what you think about that.
Clara: Yeah, I think our place is everywhere. I think it's beyond, and you know, I think we're starting to see social work and sport, for instance. You know, mental health right now in the business community has really taken off that's a beautiful place for social workers. We really have opportunities across the gamut and we're only limited by ourselves and our own mental constructs of what a quote, unquote, social worker is. It’s not just child welfare anymore, it is so much broader and I think, as it infuses, as we infuse social work across our system, across our political system, our business system, you know, expanding it on the nonprofit side, I think our values system will follow and that will create just wonderful opportunities to have different kinds of conversations than we’ve ever had before.
Chris: Well, you know, you think about things, now trauma does not necessarily know a certain strata of the culture. Trauma is pervasive and a lot of people, most people, have experienced some sort of trauma themselves. Autism is something that knows no bounds with regards to income. Hospice is a place where social workers do incredible work, but guess what we all have loved ones die, and so, as I think about where we fit in in society, and where I think decision makers pigeonhole us many times, is we're much more pervasive than what, you mentioned if we're giving credit for. We're not just child welfare. We literally discharge your mom from the hospital. You know, we can sit in your boardroom and talk to your board about board development and I think that this whole concept of business and social work’s time has come.
Clara: Mm hm, oh I agree one-thousand percent. And, again I think that that's where the university has opportunity. It has opportunity to partner with business schools, you know, look at Muma College of Business. It's an amazing business school, but there's wonderful opportunities to do some co-work in that space, and again, it doesn't mean that you're not going to be a clinical social worker. Again, back in my day, you had the clinical social work track and then you had like this generalist track and then you had this kind of business-y track. Bologna sandwich! You have to be able to function across all three of those if you're going to be successful and, again, you know you may graduate and think, “I'm going to just be this,” but, you know, if you get to a place where you learn sometimes you just have to show up and say yes and figure it out as you go, it’s amazing the path you will take. But to be able to have experience and skill sets across all of those domains, I think is not only necessary but I think that's what brings the value that I'm not just looked at as that touchy feely social worker. No! I got a business background. I can actually make some business decisions that are also good for society.
Chris: Well, I think there's a level, you know, there's a lot of generational kind of gnashing of teeth between the Z’ers and the X’ers and the, you know, millennials and all that, but the fact is, I see this in our students, our students really come to us preconditioned, seeking work-life integration. I don't want to call it balance, because I think if you call a balance it puts the onus on the person and there's no way we can stop what's happening to us in, usually, either place. But that work-life integration, and they want, they want to have a personal life and so figuring that out alongside long-standing agencies like yours is an interesting space that I don't know if you're finding that, where you're working right now taking on new employees, but they have different expectations of us than they did 10 or 15 years ago, I think.
Clara: They sure do and I will own it, myself. I sometimes have trouble, you know, not going back to, “what do you mean that you're going to leave at 5:00. Wait a minute. What, what is this?”
Chris: Right, right.
Clara: So, I think that as we, as the leaders or older generation whatever you want to call us, we've also got to learn how to adapt into this world, too, because I think I think there are some unrealistic expectations of some of our students, but I also think that there's unreal expectations on the part of us as employers, too, and so, I think that over time we're going to find that balance. The problem right now, Chris, is that the demand is higher than it has ever been before.
Chris: Absolutely.
Clara: That more and more people, and I think if there's a good thing that has come out of the pandemic it is the realization that mental health is real. You know, we get calls all the time from folks that go, “Oooh, now I get it. I thought this was all garbage, but I’m the one that can’t get out of bed anymore in the mornings because I drank an entire bottle to shut my brain off.” So, I mean, so, the need right now is so high, at a time when we're still, as an industry, trying to catch up on the pay side and being able to pay folks, so it's such an interesting space right now, again, to your point, being able to provide that work-life integration at a time when the work is higher than it's ever been.
Chris: What do you think, and prognosticate with me for five hot seconds, what do you think the future looks like with regards to behavioral health services? What would be a dreamy future? Where do you see this going?
Clare: I don't know if it's dreamy so much, Chris, as where I see the interface of AI in this process that AI is going to be able to do some of the basic INR kinds of functions in the future, the chatbots that, I mean even USF is really on the cutting edge of. That is going to free up time for social workers to be able to do more in-depth and more care coordination types of work.
Chris: And connect!
Clare: Exactly, and make those connection points. I think that's going to help make this, the seemingly overwhelming amount of work manageable, so I see that on the horizon, sooner rather than later. I think for many of the funders that there's going to have to be a relaxation of unrealistic expectations. I have learned, myself, that I don't necessarily need a bachelor's degree experienced person answering information referral lines.
Chris: Right.
Clare: That has been a wonderful realization for me and that's where opportunities for internships have come into place that we can train students, that we can get students on the lines and get them, get them working in the field, paying them you know, paying them, which is unusual.
Chris: Yeah exactly!
Clara: You know, paying them, but creating opportunities for their professional growth and advancement and also economic growth and advancement. That's the piece, I have to tell you, Chris, I'm so excited about, that we're recognizing the value of interns and that interns can actually do the work, not just side work.
Chris: Right, and not just pretend work that is out of context. You know, I do think, back to the micro/macro point that I think is really, really important, and I don't want to lose it, so funny, every one of these podcasts that I've done, we've ended up talking about the micro work people grew up in doing, you know, and loved, but how they find themselves making macro decisions on the daily now and, of course, we're getting slung policies being slung at us, like, I mean it's, it's nuts it's a rapid fire pace in deciding what you respond to versus what you just ignore and hope goes away blah, blah, blah, but I do think our students now, you've taught policy some, I do think our students now see the value of those policy classes in those macro classes, as well, to go along with their clinical practice wouldn't you say?
Clara: They don't walk in the door with that.
Chris: No.
Clara: I will tell you that. They don't walk in the door necessarily with that appreciation and I think that's where, because I taught– I was very fortunate to be able to teach macro in the fall semester and that was what was so much fun, was to be able to make those connection points to help them understand, again, exactly what I started out with and I believe this in my heart. You can't work at the micro helping people to get better if you don't understand how the macro world is impacting an individual every single day, how what happened, how policy impacts how people are surviving and you’ve got to understand those in order to be able to help your client navigate and, again, get to their place of better. Because if you think you can do that in isolation the macro, you're never going to be a good successful clinician, in my humble opinion.
Chris: I totally agree with you and what I love seeing happen is, yes, there is macro and there's micro but they're in practice there really isn't.
Clara: Oh, heavens, no.
Chris: In the sense that it's a total blend of the two you know. Why are these AHCA rates so low? We can't afford to do groups for people, and you know, I mean, this is something we live in on the daily and people want to rail against and I think a lot of times it's where we find our retention problems are some of the policies that are in place that prohibit us from bringing all of our skills to the table.
Clara: Absolutely, and one of the things that was such a fun a-ha moment for me, and somebody said it in the context and it really, you know, we created … we are human beings everything that has been created, we did, which means we can undo it and I think that's the other important piece of macro, you know, when we get to a place as clinicians and just throw up our hands and go “Ugh! It’s never going to change!” Well then that, at that point, you’re right, it’s never going to change because it's our responsibility to keep pushing for that change, not just say, “oh, this sucks, this sucks and here's how it can be better.”
Chris: Right, right, right, right.
Clara: And that's the important part.
Chris: Well, that's the critical thinking part that I think we have to spend more time on. I keep coming back to self-reflection and critical thinking as probably my two most important goals for our students and I think that there's a really important piece of unlearning everything we've learned to this point because there's so much of it that is so innately ... we know now it's wrong we know now trauma is so pervasive.
Clara: Yes.
Chris: It probably needs to be the lead diagnosis if we're going to diagnose with most folks, right?
Clara: Everything! Everything starts with trauma. Everything.
Chris: And so, that's new that's fairly new news. I mean that's really 10-years new, right, and so because of that, I think it's forced our hand, because our whole pair structure and everything was built on a diagnosis kind of structure and here we are with people that don't fit in those boxes anymore, so I just say to students all the time, it’s a fascinating time to be a social worker. I think in my career I think it's the most fascinating time ever.
Clara: It certainly is. And I want to, I want to just come back to one thing that you say, Chris, because it was a real a-ha moment for me as a as an instructor, again, this past fall. I had a student who was really talking about, you know, bureaucracies and government and politicians as if there were somehow out to get everybody and I had to really kind of try to reframe that conversation because, you know, at that time, in that classroom, I was that government person. So, I said that, so I pushed back and said, “does that mean I’m bad because I'm a government employee right in this moment?” and I think that, you know, we have to help students unlearn that you can either go from two places that everybody is out to screw everybody or that everybody's doing the very best they can with the information that they come from. I believe that we've got politicians making decisions who are not trained in the practice that they are deciding upon, but they're doing the best with the information that they have.
Chris: We have that in social work! We have people making decisions in social work that are not trained.
Clara: Correct, correct.
Chris: You know, I mean it is pervasive in that sense and the other thing that I think is really important in all of this is the power of people's stories, you know, and you want to educate a legislator, and I’m not talking about lobbying I'm just talking about educate, basic education, tell a story, tell your personal story, because I do think that we are beginning to revalue, if you will, lived experience and lived expertise
Clara: I agree. I agree.
Chris: And you know there’s so many … go ahead, go ahead, say more about that.
Clara: And I think that, as we start to do this, and as we start to realize that through those stories you get that human-to-human connection, that's where the hope starts and, with hope, you're going to reduce that burnout, you're going to reduce that sense of, “I'm not, I can't make a difference.” You can. We just have to think about different ways of getting our information, our message across. I can't emphasize enough, there are some people that need stats, but everybody connects to a story.
Chris: Yes.
Clara: Stats and stories woven together are hugely, hugely impactful.
Chris: Well, we’ve cornered, I think, you know, we potentially, we collect so many stats, if we would pile on our stories, we've cornered the market on that blend at some level as, again, yet another place for social workers to be.
Clara: Absolutely, and I think, but I think storytelling is an art.
Chris: Yes.
Clara: I think that there, and I think that that's an opportunity for social work universities, for you know, colleges of social work, to actually offer some micro classes in this advocacy storytelling approach so that in that two minutes that you might have, you can be the most impactful person as possible and not just completely overwhelm somebody to where they turn it off.
Chris: Well, so much of that I think goes back to the basic skill of listening and listening to hear not listening to respond and so, you know, you know this. The reality is, you know, in most situations in our field, we have 20 maybe quality minutes with a client, unless we're on the standard hour we don't have … because we're moving to the next, we're moving to the next one. So, for that 20 minutes I have to be fully connected and engaged with you as your social worker to hear what you're telling me, I think. So, we do have to slow ourselves down a little bit, I think.
Clara: Mm hm, and be able to tease out really what's the client saying….
Chris: Right.
Clara: …so that you can help them get to their place of better. But I think we have to turn that same skill around when we're advocating. What is it that is going to resonate with the individual I'm talking to so that they can actually hear what I'm saying and not just try to respond.
Chris: Well, and I think part of that, we’ve kind of come full circle because part of that goes back to the business of social work and legislators, as much heart as legislators go into this with, they realize a lot of their job is managing funds and so, you know, and so, as social workers a good story is great, but unless you can tie it to savings or prevention dollars or something like that, I really think we … and for years we've kind of avoided that as kind of a bad, “oh social workers don't talk about money,” you know, we've got to do better about making those conversations go together, I think.
Clara: And that, I think, has been one of our biggest weaknesses. We don't talk about money so everyone just assumes that we're going to do it for free.
Chris: Right or that we don’t care. Yeah.
Clara: And we also just been in this place where, you know, “okay we'll just tighten our belt.” Again, it doesn't that does nobody any good. I think we all have to say, look we know what it takes to perform a unit of service, to provide an outcome, this is what it costs. I can't do more, I can’t do less. This is what I need to do, but historically, we have allowed ourselves to be the doormat. Oh, you know, for the greater good, I’m going to do less. Baloney, because you're not doing anybody a greater good. You're just saying that that is that there's a there's an there's no value to what you're doing.
Chris: That's right!
Clara: And I disagree with that wholeheartedly.
Chris: You know, and you get what you pay for, right?
Clara: Absolutely.
Chris: You know, if I go to a decent restaurant, I expect a decent meal. Well, if I'm paying a social worker a livable wage then I should have an expectation, so we're going to have to step up to that expectation, as well, which I think is going to have some impact that I think, I do think the skill set for new social workers is going to change a bit because I do think they're going to have to be able to articulate the value add and not just the story. I think they're going to, they're going to be able to ascertain what the value add of that was, not just that individual which is great, which is the story, but the value to the larger society – the cost-benefit analysis, if you will.
Clara: Absolutely, and I will say that now is just a beautiful time for our students to learn this information because the aging of our social service system is coming, is coming here now. I mean it’s come of age, quote unquote.
Chris: Right, right, right, yeah.
Clara: So, our students are going to be moving rapidly into hierarchical positions within agencies very quickly and they’re going to have to be the ones that can navigate the micro with the macro to be able to tell those stories, to be able to understand the business pieces of it and that's why it's so important to arm students with the business understanding and the business acumen. You’ve got to know what a unit of service costs. You have to. And it's not, “Okay I got to serve 100 clients. I have $100, so it's a buck a client.”
Chris: Right.
Clara: Nuh-uh. Some clients are going to cost 25 cents and some that are going to cost you $1.50. You have to understand that so that you can articulate it and be able to advocate for the appropriate resources.
Chris: Well, I mean, even to what's reimbursable versus what's not and the services that have the higher rates of pay and when do you make that ethical decision it doesn't matter, they need this so we're going to do this even though we're going to miss out on that hundred dollars or whatever, I mean, because the other thing that I think we find in our profession that I don't know, other than probably the medical profession, is as clear are all the ethical dilemmas. You know? And I think part of what we do when we're giving our services away goes to the heart of those ethical dilemmas. Well, that, I've got to serve that person because if I don't serve that person, nobody's going to serve that person. And it's a really, it's a Sophie’s choice I think a lot of times for managers.
Clara: And I also think that, just because we can't serve them doesn't mean that they're not going to get service someplace else. Maybe, maybe there’s another entity that has funding for this particular individual. Maybe I've got to look at the donor community. Maybe I've got to figure out how do I tell a story to somebody so that they will give us funds to be able to fund this. Again, I think we've got to get out of the mindset that Medicaid is going to pay 100% for folks, because it’s just not. We’ve got to be able to diversify the funding that comes into our organization. We've got to look at fundraising and I will tell you I hate, I have always said I hated fundraising, being here at the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay I recognize how important it is because it truly is that bridge between …
Chris: … what saves you …
Clara: Between the community being able to help somebody in need and I think there's a story there to be told. So, again, no business goes in with only a single funding source. If they do, we see them go out of business.
Chris: Right, right.
Clara: And I think social work has been in this place of, “you know, oh, it's all about Medicaid.” It can't be anymore.
Chris: No, no. It can’t be about Medicaid, it can’t be about child welfare foster care dollars, it can't be. There is no one source that it can be about, because then you've got the intervening variables of insurance companies and all of the rules and all the edits that your bills hit and just because you billed a hundred thousand this month doesn’t mean you’re getting it. I can guarantee you you're not getting a hundred thousand this month, even if you billed it. Half a dozen of those are going to hit edits and before you know it, you're going to be getting half of that money.
Clara: Right.
Chris: And having to resubmit, so I mean there's so many little nuances that I really think we could do probably in education a better job of at least inoculating people for.
Clara: I agree, I agree 1000%. Ah, yeah and helping folks just get, even if they just get a cursory, enough that they go, “Okay I've had more questions than I have answers. I think I know where to go.” And be able to teach folks where to go. You might not be able to teach them everything, but I think that's a really important piece about how does the money work in social service. It’s very complicated.
Chis: Well, it’s the parallel process, really like all the complicated stuff with families. I keep being reminded of how everything we teach baby social workers to do with families we need to be doing with our own staff and our own community partners and leaders in social work there are times and you know this, it's no giant secret, there are times when we need to treat those people that we’re dealing with that are making decisions like we would treat some of our clients. we need to ask similar questions, we need to connect with them, we need … there are certain things we need to put the work in, the same kind of work we're getting in with the front line.
Clara: Absolutely, absolutely. Because again they’re human beings on the other side – human beings with trauma.
Chris: Right!
Clara: So, you know, recognizing that and walking in with that space in mind as you're going along with the business can go a long way and getting, you know, to your point, Chris, I mean that's absolutely beautiful because I live this every single freaking day, you know. You, you do 100 grand worth of work and you're you know reimbursed for 40 grand of it. Okay, where’s that other 60 going to come from? It’s got to come from somewhere and so having those relationships and really being able to leverage relationships and leverage, again, other funding sources to make things work – that's what makes social service so different from a for-profit because a for-profit would just say, “it's a loss leader cut it and be done.” Back to your ethical dilemma. I can’t.
Chris: Well, and then the transparency on top of that, by the way, report literally everything you're doing while you're doing it. So, right, you know corporations in the United States of America don't always have that transparency pressure. I mean, it's fine, I don't mind, but it is a lot of work to meet those outcomes that are sometimes set really from a distance of what the problem really is you know and so how do I make what happened today fit into that outcome.
Clara: Right because oftentimes they’re not outcomes, Chris, you and I both know that. They’re outputs. They’re widgets.
Chris: They’re outputs.
Clara: Yeah, I love to call them widgets.
Chris: Yep.
Clara: You know, nobody cares, you know, how many sessions somebody got.
Chris: Nobody reads the report.
Clara: Yeah! I mean, you know, it’s ... you know it's so some of this is just you know what I call, you know, the spray and pray. Like let's just stick anything on the wall and see what sticks, you know. So that's what I think makes social work more complicated, what makes social service, mental health, behavioral health, more complicated, is trying to figure out how do you demonstrate when somebody gets better. What does that look like?
Chris: Right, what does better look like?
Clara: What does better look like and then how do you put a dollar amount around that? How do you make an outcome that goes to this place called better, when better is individual for every person?
Chris: Well, and I think that also goes to the individual argument of success and self-care because you got to think about how many times of a day, Clara, do you redefine success for yourself based on, “okay I didn't get a million dollars, but I did make a connection with this potential funder who may eventually give me $75,000. Okay that's success, right?” And so, it's that constant shifting for us so that we don't feel like we're pouring water on sand.
Clara: Well sure, and it also is the burnout piece that we, you know, we briefly touched upon. If every time I went to ask for a million dollars and I only got 750, for instance, I need to be able to celebrate that as opposed to, “Oh crap here I go again, I'm a loser again,” and you start down this very negative road, so a lot of it is trying to be in that place of, “I just have to I have to practice that the glass is half full the glass is half full.”
Chris: That’s right!!
Clara: The self-care that's required to have that practice of okay, “I'm doing the best I can and the best is fine,” and that again goes back to what we give our clients. I love how you made that connection between the micro and the macro. You know we tell our clients, “You don’t have to be perfect all the time. It's not always going to work out perfectly, but you're going to give it your best shot, and then try again.” We as clinicians, as administrators, things like that, we've got to give ourselves that same grace, and I don’t think we do a good job at that.
Chris: No, we don’t and I think, in fact, sometimes I think we teach the opposite of that.
Clara: I agree. I agree.
Chris: We celebrate exhaustion.
Clara: [laughs]
Chris: I find it all the time because I’ll ask my colleagues, “How are you?” And they’re like, “Well, I've got this and I’ve got this.” I mean we go immediately to tasks. “No, no. How are you?”
Clara: Yeah.
Chris: I mean it the question when you really ask it, it just disarms people because nobody asks how I am. “Well thank you for asking! I'm tired!”
Clara: [laughs]
Chris: You know, and I don't think we do that with one another.
Clara: Right.
Chris: Which, I’m excited about because I think with the Professional Advisory Committee and as we move towards a really solid town-gown kind of relationship, we can do that for you. I say to people all the time, “I'm done knocking on doors.” Lord, help me. No, I don't want to even guess what's on the other side that door. I'm good. I'm good. But I will celebrate you knocking on doors until the cows come home. I’m in your corner and I can support you that way. I don't want to do it anymore, but I can support you, and so I think having that relationship with practitioners like yourself who also get this other piece is such a benefit to our students I want to say again.
Clara: Oh, no question, and one of the things we talked about the professional advisory that popped into my head as you were talking was, you know, we as the community really need to do some job fairs in the School of Social Work to talk about what we do, have the students have a sense that not everything is private practice, that there is a whole other world that you may not want to live in forever, but you may want to dabble in it for, you know, two years, two and a half years, before you make your next leap. It’s just amazing opportunities for experiences, but I don’t think our students really know, again, the breadth and the depth of how social work can impact individuals, communities, and society.
Chris: Well, and you and I just talked about it, we could think of new ways to do it sitting right here.
Clara: Sure.
Chris: I don't think we’ve even thought of all the ways that, you know, but, but I do love talking about it.
Clara: I do, too.
Chris: And I do love discussing what could be. Let's face it, you and I are probably planting trees for– or seeds for trees we’re not going to sit under. I mean that’s just, you know ...
Clara: I hope!
Chris: Me too! I– don’t want to live forever. [laughs] And I love, I will say this, the greatest thing now at 30 plus years of this are colleagues like yourself who get that. For me, there's a moment of respite in that relationship where we can sit together and we're like, “you know,” and we can prognosticate and we can also be cynical and snarky with each other because we know we've been there.
Clara: Sure.
Chris: But, but we can still cast a vision for what this thing could be, and to me, having colleagues like yourself out there who like to vision cast just makes my day so much better just so you know that I appreciate that.
Clara: Mine, too. Mine, too. And to be able to vision cast with students.
Chris: Yes!
Clara: And for students to actually go “Oooh, I hadn't thought of that” or “Oh, I didn't know.” You know, when you talk about planting seeds, I was laughing because I wasn't thinking about the age. I'm like you know half the time you plant a seed and it gets blown away or thrown away. It never actually gets a chance to germinate. That's the piece that's exciting for me.
Chris: Right.
Clara: For all the seeds that we cast, those that actually germinate and turn into something, that is, that's the magic right there.
Chris: Well and then building the greenhouse where they can thrive. Right?
Clara: Yes.
Chris: I mean, so that's what I feel about education, we are building greenhouses for all sorts of plants but sometimes those greenhouses have to be very specific to the needs of that individual, so … and the same goes for you sitting where you’re sitting. You have to know how your staff learn and what motivates them individually because, if not, you're just casting a straight line across all this and you're going to miss the highers and the lowers.
Clara: Absolutely, absolutely. And, again, it's an art more than a science. You think that you know, but you know, you don't necessarily. And oftentimes you can even ask students, you can ask new employees, you know, “What does your self-care look like? How do you like to learn?” And because they have never really been asked that question, they don't– they don't think in those terms, they don't know, so we're kind of experimenting as we go. So, again, I think it's a great opportunity for the university to really be able to push, you know, understanding your own trauma, understanding your ... how are you going to take care of you once you leave the profession, and giving the responsibility for taking care of yourself on you and not external to the organization or to others.
Chris: Well and it – I say to students all the time, “Start the way you want to finish.”
Clara: Yes. That’s a great, brilliant point.
Chris: Start the way you want to finish, because if you don't block time for yourself now, you never will. So, you should start out that way. Make that your practice. Make that like breathing, because the other piece that I think there's a platinum rule that I love and it's to treat others the way you expect to be treated. I think that goes for leaders, and I also think that goes for those people on the front line. I think that goes for employees and how they respond to their employer. Treat that employer the way you would expect to be treated if you were Clara Reynolds, CEO, you know, of the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay and so that's why I think discussions like this are important for people to have insight that you have the same struggles that they have on that front line, just as an agency head.
Clara: Oh absolutely! Absolutely and, you know, one of the things that I love being able to do is new hire orientation and being able to meet the new staff and we do new hire orientation every month and I say to them and I say this with absolute genuineness, I don't make the mission of the Crisis Center happen. Our mission is to ensure that no one has to face crisis alone. Clara doesn’t do that.
Chris: Right.
Clara: It is each and every one of you. You are the ones. You are the ones. And know that folks are coming to you, and they are not having a good day. There is nobody that comes to my door or picks up the phone to call me that's having a good day, and you're the one that's going to make that difference. And some days, that's the only good thing that's going to happen in your day is just knowing that you showed up and you were there.
Chris: But that’s success. And that was success.
Clara: And that was success! Exactly!
Chris: Yes!
Clara: And that’s success.
Chris: Count it as a win. Yep. Clara, I will just say as we're wrapping this thing up, you are remarkable in so many ways. Guys, in addition she's a long-distance swimmer, so I mean just to kind of show you what kind of tenacity our friend and colleague has.
Clara: Or craziness. [laughs]
Chris: [laughs] I think it’s awesome. The other day I was out, I was out in the water and we were out on the boat and we were out in the water and there are these guys, and their wives were swimming and the guys were in kayaks paddling beside them, and he goes, “Oh it's just a fun little 15-mile swim.” I thought holy …
Clara: Oh, I know all those guys! They’re nuts.
Chris: Yeah, just a fun little 15-mile swim. I said you know, your definition of fun and mine, I can’t even relate, so.
Clara: [laughs]
Chris: But thank you. Thank you, Clara…
Clara: Thank you Chris.
Chris: … for spending this time with me. And, so, guys reach out if you'd like to do a placement, paid internship, find a job at the Crisis Center of Tampa Bay, reach out because this woman can hook you up, and you just heard how the culture is, and so I think it's really, really important if this discussion kind of hit you in all the right places, reach out to the Crisis Center because there's plenty of opportunity there for you to go and grow.
Clara: Absolutely.
Chris: Thank you, Clara. I appreciate your time.
Clara: Thank you, Chris. You’re fabulous. Thank you, sir.